NIMH Planet of the Rats
by Sharks Potter
Summary: In the near future, the starship NIMH-1 is sent to explore the star system of Alpha Centauri. When Captain Josh Anderson is sent to inspect a new planet, his pod crash-lands on an inhospitable world, where giant, intelligent rats rule. Stranded and hunted down by the Rats, he is taken in by the Brisby family. Maybe unravelling the secret of this strange world is his only hope left?
1. Chapter 1 Prologue

**Disclaimer:** The characters of _The Secret of NIMH_ belong to Robert C O'Brien, the author of the original 1971 novel, and Don Bluth, the 1982 film adaptation director. Also, a few parts of the sci-fi universe used in this story are either borrowed or inspired from Tim Burton's 2001 _Planet of the Apes_, and other space-travel films. I only own the human characters, which aren't based on any real-life people, alive or dead. Any similarity is purely coincidental and no profit is intended from this work.

**Dedication:** This work is dedicated to the memory of Elizabeth 'Biff' Hartman (1943-1987), whose amazing voice talent brought the character of Mrs Brisby (Frisby in the novel) to life on screen in the 1982 film adaptation by Don Bluth. Also, my adaptation of the character, who had no first name in the book or film, is named after her.

By the year 2020, global economy had collapsed completely, along with much of society. In a dystopian world of poverty, crime, warfare, overpopulation, pollution, and dwindling of natural resources, which were the order of the sables of society, the strong rose to take control. As it had always happened in the past, with Darwin's theory of evolution in action on the social scale, the few wealthy industrialists, militarists, and politicians, who had the resources and brains, built their own private domains by preying on the weak.

The cooperation on the cutting edge was the National Industries for the Mobilisation of Humanity, commonly referred to as NIMH. Founded by wealthy industrialist and scientist Dr Thomas Valentine in the early 2020s, NIMH Cooperation rose from the ashes of the dying world, eventually growing to become a world power, with influence in every major government and introducing a revolutionary industry to reshape the world.

With over a billion employees, NIMH had countless of departments and subsidiaries worldwide, with factories in every field of production, in addition to its virtually infinite property, resources and funds. And that didn't come to the profit it amassed in the process, much of which went into investments for even greater projects, adding to its seemingly never-ending credit. NIMH run industries in food production, engineering, pharmaceuticals, refineries, mines, power plants, and was even the world's largest military contractor. Although not a declared leader, its sole owner Dr Valentine had become the new Kublai Khan of the modern world.

By the 2030s, NIMH's silver Great Owl logo could be found on 90% of all industrial goods produced worldwide, whether civilian or military, and even extraterrestrial. Among its many projects that had reshaped the world in Dr Valentine's image, were its investments in space exploration and colonisation – the tycoon's ultimate goal, to mobilise the dominance of the human race beyond the boundaries of the known world.

By the year 2035, in cooperation with the global Space Programs, NIMH had established the first permanent, international colony on the Moon; by 2050, it had started conducting commercial mining on Mars, followed by other space outposts scattered all around the solar system; and that still wasn't enough. With the Earth still dangerously overpopulated, polluted beyond recovery, and with natural resources dwindling, NIMH embarked on its ultimate project yet: the taking of the stars.

Although it had already established permanent colonies and outposts on the Moon and Mars, those worlds were still dependant on the Earth in one way or another, making them unsuitable for sustaining a functioning biosphere, and thus unable for accommodating the entire human race. What NIMH – and humanity as a whole – needed was a new planet; one with the right mass, gravity, magnetosphere, atmosphere, and elements, which could be terraformed, developed, and eventually populated from scratch. In other words, NIMH sought to create a new Earth.

A place like this could never hope to be found in the Earth's solar system; the only other planet within the habitable zone, which wasn't already occupied, was Venus and it had long since been determined to be completely unsuitable for terraforming; as for the Jovian system, or any of the other planets outside the habitable zone, they were either frozen in eternal darkness, or otherwise baking in the face of the Sun, with no environment even remotely capable of sustaining life. That left only one place to look: beyond the outer reach.

Although the nearest star system, Alpha Centauri was over four light years away, and the Earth's leading brains only had hazy assumptions as to whether on not it had a habitable planet at all, NIMH would not be swayed from its goal. An international treaty was drawn up, uniting all of the world's space agencies together, to plan the greatest space mission in history, with NIMH providing the key funding and resources for the project.

And so it was in the year 2060, that the deep space research starship _NIMH-1_ began construction in Earth's orbit. Her mission was to last an estimated ten to twelve years, during which time the crew of the _NIMH-1_ would be subjected to the greatest physical and psychological challenges imaginable, and would have to face them entirely on their own. Communication with Earth at light-years distances is impossible; thus, the crew would have to rely exclusively on themselves and the resources of their ship, to survive – and of course, impress their employers.

The _NIMH-1_ was designed to transport a crew of eight carefully selected individuals in suspended animation to Alpha Centauri, along with a payload of bioengineered algae and anaerobic bacteria, which would be used to terraform any potentially habitable planet they discovered out there, as well as a sample of the Earth's entire biosphere, in the form of genetically-selected embryos and seedlings kept in cryostorage. This unique payload would theoretically initiate the 'rebirth' of terrestrial life on a new world, literally creating a clone of humanity's original, dying home planet.

Propelled by atomic anti-matter ion engines, which used a recently discovered nuclear compound called unobtanium, mined on Mars – the most powerful nuclear element known to man -, the _NIMH-1_ could travel at almost the speed of light, cutting the otherwise impossible journey of 40,000 years to a mere 4,5, or a little over 54 months. In the intervening time, the _NIMH-1_ would function as a sleeper ship, with both crew and payload in suspended animation, with the onboard fully automated supercomputer in control of avionics and life support.

Upon their entry into the Alpha Centauri star system, the crew would be aroused from hibernation – if they were still alive - and spend the final stage of their journey recuperating from the effects of stasis and setting up the onboard space lab and greenhouse, which would only work once they were out of the absolute zero of deep space and back in the luminosity range of a new sun.

In preparation for their long voyage and the perilous mission that lay ahead of them, while their ship was being built, the crew of the _NIMH-1_ spent almost ten years undergoing a painstaking line of training. Aside from the endless fitness sessions, psychological evaluations, and medical examinations, each man had to qualify as an expert in his field, whilst competing against a backup crewmember, who trained alongside him. Due to the uncertain nature of the mission, in which they'd be no Mission Control, the crew were also assigned backup duties amongst themselves; one's post could be taken up by another on a moment's notice, in the event of an emergency.

In addition to their field training, everyone was also trained in numerous useful skills, including first aid, survival techniques, practical skills, use of emergency equipment, as well as a complete space flying course on how to pilot the _NIMH-1_ and its pods single-handedly, in the event of the captain and first officer – or even the entire crew - becoming incapacitated or killed out there. By 2071, the finest crew ever trained for a space mission were finally up to scratch and ready to embark.

And so it was at midnight Greenwich time, on the 31st December 2071, that the _NIMH-1_, with her crew safely placed in stasis, fired up her ion rocket boosters for the first time. Millions of spectators on the ground, watching the launch via video feed up in the International Space Station, saw the prototype starship leave Earth's orbit, accelerating to the speed of light in seconds, heading in a straight line towards Alpha Centauri.

Within weeks, the ship's transponder signal ceased, as the ship entered the dead zone, past the orbit of Pluto, along with any visual contact. The _NIMH-1_ had left humanity's little corner of the infinite universe completely, heading off into the unknown regions of deep space. Unbeknownst to anyone back on Earth, this was only the beginning of a journey, which was to take one man beyond the known boundaries of space and time, on a journey to seek his own destiny. His name was Captain Josh Anderson, and this is his story…

**Author's note:** This is my first Secret of NIMH fanfic. As you've probably noticed, on my profile there is a preview for another NIMH story, which was meant to be more canon; however, at the last minute, I chose to go with something more original. This story will also combine themes from the _Planet of the Apes_ franchise. Coming up next, introduction of Josh Anderson and the rest of the crew when they awake from stasis… Enjoy and please review!


	2. Chapter 2 Captain Anderson of the NIMH-1

**Date: June 10****th**** 2076 Earth Time**

**Location: Outer Boundaries of Alpha Centauri-A Habitable Zone**

**Mission Time: 53 Months, 11 Days, 8 Hours**

In suspended animation you don't dream; it is like dying and then coming back from the grave. At least that was the first thought that crossed Josh's mind when he opened his eyes, some 53 months after the launch. His last recollection was being giving him a highly unpleasant shot in the neck and helped into his hibernation tank, followed by a complete loss of any recollection. So he had to fight a panic attack as he woke to find himself encased inside the water-filled, coffin-shaped glass tank, with a breathing tube stuck down his throat and a vest of bio-med sensors strapped to his torso.

Captain Joshua 'Josh' Anderson was the pod pilot onboard the _NIMH-1_; a navy pilot for the British Marines, he had grown up on his uncle's farm in Hampshire England as a boy, graduating from Cambridge with a degree in aeronautical engineering, before joining Her Majesty's Royal Air Corps. Having fought on the front lines in the Third World War of 2045 and the New British Civil War of 2062, flying every archaic tin-pot kite or state-of-the-art experimental aircraft in existence, he had made his reputation as a distinguished aviator. Then, at the age of thirty, he had been recruited by NIMH, to train as a space pilot and EVA specialist for the mission. In other words, he was the _NIMH-1_'s cab driver.

On his part, Josh was to be the official representative of the British Crown on the new world, given how NIMH had hired several of England's top-notch aviation scientists for the construction of the _NIMH-1_'s state-of-the-art exploration pods. Realising his chance of fulfilling his life's ambition of reaching beyond his horizons, Josh had been ecstatic at the honour, if not a little weary of the risks involved in this mission.

This was the first voyage in which a crew would be kept in suspended animation for so long – the longest being the first round-trip to Mars some 25 years prior, which had only lasted six months -, leading to some debate as to whether or not there would be any after-effects to consider. Josh and his colleagues had been warned from the start that the greatest danger of all was the firing-up of the _NIMH-1_'s experimental ion drives, which would cause the ship to instantly accelerate to almost the speed of light, equivalent to a killer force of around 50Gs. This was why the hibernation tanks had been designed to fill with shock absorbent gel, shielding the astronauts from the acceleration…theoretically.

The long hibernation period would also require having a breathing tube stuck down the astronaut's throat for the entire duration of the stasis; if the life support didn't perform as advertised, the ship could easily become the first mausoleum in space. And then there was the question of the unknown effects of long-term hibernation to consider; even in stasis, where all vital functions drop to barely 1% of normal, the body metabolism isn't entirely gone, leaving the possibility of how long one can survive in hibernation in question…including the prospect of waking up halfway through the journey, at which point he'd be encased alive in his coffin of a tank with no hope of escape.

Panicking, thinking his life support had failed, he began banging his hands against the plexiglas cover, thinking he was about to drown; before he knew what was happening, the tank had drained like a bathtub having its plug pulled, as the system sensed his brainwave activity resume as he returned to full consciousness. Next thing, the seal popped and the lid tilted open; Josh only had a second to reassure himself that everything was all right, when he realised how weak and thin he was, his usually muscular frame shrunken to that of an old lady's after 4,5 years worth of muscle atrophy.

Although relieved to have survived the acceleration and the long-term hibernation, Josh hardly felt 'good as new' as theorised in the manual; every movement felt painful, his joints creaking like old hinges, his muscles shrunken tight like rubber. And currently, he still had that damn tube struck down his throat, which he couldn't get out. As he sat up, chocking, he felt someone tilt his head back and pull the breathing tube out. Coughing and splattering, he turned to see his friend and colleague Dr Gordon Boniface, wearing only a towel around his waist, beaming at him, "Welcome back from the dead, Josh!"

Dr Boniface, a man in his early fifties, was the _NIMH-1_'s medical officer, one of the world's leading minds in medicine, having treated over eighty million patients throughout his career, before being recruited for the _NIMH-1_ mission. Josh secretly suspected the man hoped to win a second Nobel Prize for advancing space medicine out here, where he'd have an entire crew and medical bay at his sole disposal. He nodded his gratitude as the doctor passed him some coffee.

"We there yet?" groaned Josh, taking a sip, only to feel the contents of his stomach about to spill as he swallowed; Dr Boniface barely had time to pass a waste paper bag to Josh, before the pilot barfed up both the coffee and pre-launch breakfast – or what was left of it anyway – from 4,5 years ago. The doctor shook his head, "Easy there lad; your body is in shock from the after-effects of stasis. Take your time." Passing Josh a spare towel, he hurried away to help another awakening crewmember.

An hour later, the crew of the _NIMH-1_, dressed and helping themselves to fluids and calcium energy bars, were assembled in the observation room for briefing. This unique facility of the ship, at first glance, was a bare, dome-shaped chamber, which housed the onboard state-of-the-art 4-D holographic projection equipment. This fascinating breakthrough technology could put up data on screen in stunning 4-D graphics, with links to the e-library and A.I. software in the ship's database.

Powered by a prototype radioisotope thermoelectric generator, the ship's command centre and crew habitat as a whole was a revolutionary wonder of technology and engineering; equipped with all the facilities needed to make up for all the physical and mental inconveniences encountered during lengthy space travel, the crew didn't lack anything required to satisfy their daily physical and psychological needs.

With artificial gravity, light and heating in all compartments, the ship was also equipped with a database containing a vast archive of every e-book, film, and music soundtrack, courtesy of the Global Board of Education, easily accessible by every member of the crew, which would serve as their entertainment centre for the voyage.

The onboard facilities consisted of the most advanced space lab and astronomical centre ever launched into space, capable of studying the new star system and all its planets in every detail; for ground expeditions and EVAs, the ship had several state-of-the-art ion-drive-powered pods, suitable for space and atmospheric flight alike; in addition, there were a number of unmanned pods onboard, housing science packages and containers for the algae, which were to be used for the panspermia operations. For extensive ground exploration, the ship also carried an automated habitat, which could be set up as an outpost for the crew, hundreds of miles away from the mother ship.

The final touch to their arsenal were a number of special copies of the famous Rosetta Disk – a gift by the Smithsonian Institution -, carried aboard ship, as well as mounted on each of the pods, each edged with microscopic pages of text in all known languages, including vocabulary lists, bible verses and scriptures, and scientific formulas, as well as greetings from every nation – a descendant of the original gold disk used on the _Voyager_ probes. Although the possibility of finding any intelligent life out there to deliver this gift to seemed unlikely, experts hadn't outruled the possibility altogether.

Their flight uniforms were fairly plain fashion: navy-blue, single-piece, cotton-and-polyester outfits, similar to those of the old Apollo astronauts, suitable for zero gravity, which they wore over their t-shirts and underwear. Each uniform was marked with the _NIMH-1_ owl logo knitted on the right hand side of the chest, the crewmember's surname on the left, as well as the flannel flag of the country represented, knitted on the top of the left sleeve. A cap, also bearing the _NIMH-1_ logo, and a pair of sneakers completed the crew's simple wardrobe.

Gen. Commander Paul Fitzgibbons, the iron-fisted mission commander of the _NIMH-1_, already fully dressed and waiting, having skipped breakfast in preparation for the briefing session, called his crew of seven at attention and conducted a round-call.

Aside from Josh and Dr Boniface, there was Lt. Commander Penny Stacy, Fitzgibbons's second-in-command and head of the space lab; Major Frank Wilson, navigator and avionics officer; Colonel Derek Strauss, engineering officer and key designer of the ion propulsion system. The two civilian members of the crew were Dr Cole Schultz, terraforming scientist and their key specialist for their ground operations on the new world; and finally, Dr George Stetson, the astrophysicist, whose study of the universe rivalled even that of the late Steven Hawking.

The room, including dome and floor, suddenly went dark and morphed into a 4-D planetarium representation of the new solar system outside the ship, with digital icons, seemingly suspended in mid-air, displaying data. Josh smiled at the sight of some of his colleagues fighting vertigo, as the ship seemed to turn 'invisible' all around them, leaving them 'suspended' in deep space. Fitzgibbons, too firmly disciplined to flinch at the uneasy experience of floating in a 4-D hologram representation of the universe – something he and his crew had done thousands of time before during training – and began his speech.

"Ladies and gentlemen, it is my pleasure to announce that we have all come through the first difficult stage of our voyage unharmed; you will all be further delighted to hear that, approximately twelve hours ago, we entered the habitable zone of Alpha Centauri-A, at which point our ion engines powered down on schedule; we are now in orbital flight around this new star, which exceeds the size of our own by nearly a quarter, and which is also part of a triple star system; any worlds attached to this system see three suns in their skies…" Turning to the touch-screen control panel, mounted on a pedestal in the centre of the room, he punched in some commands and the planetarium zoomed in to a couple of companion planets orbiting the star.

"This, people, is our ultimate destination. Since coming within visual range of Alpha Centauri, our onboard planetary mapping hardware has been automatically mapping our new solar system; in addition to the three sister stars – A, B, and Proximal Centauri – there are two new planets, orbiting Centauri-A: the first is a gas giant, similar to Jupiter; the second its Earth-mass sized satellite. Further analysis by SAR indicates that this planet has an atmosphere…" Instant muttering broke out among the spectators; it seemed the likelihood of coming all this way to find a new world had been worthwhile.

"And what else do we know about these new planets, Captain?" asked Dr Schultz, raising his finger like a schoolboy asking to use the loo, eager to get to the point. Fitzgibbons frowned slightly at being interrupted, always preferring to hear a simple acknowledgement of any orders he gave without discussion, yet his military code of making allowances for the 'undisciplined' civilian members of his team, which he was literally expect to babysit on this mission, won out.

"That, Doctor, will be explained to you in greater detail by our astrophysicist," he said, summoning up Dr Stetson, "Dr Stetson, the floor is yours." The lanky astrophysicist, who was fighting the worst case of vertigo of all, hurried up to join Fitzgibbons, almost as if afraid he'd drop through the invisible floor and into the universe.

Taking out a crystalline, giant-dice-shaped device, called a hologram cube – a descendant of the old memory sticks, complete with their own data drive, power supply, and 4-D projection camera, all rolled into one – he placed it on the control panel and activated it. The cube's subsections lit up with graphics, which were projected across the room in the form of written data, and added to the planetarium projections; Josh watched in fascination how the blurred graphics, encountering obstacles in their path, automatically adjusted and straitening themselves out, by means of microscopic adjustment fibre-lenses which made up the cube's 4-D multiplane camera. Twenty years earlier, the problem of finding a smooth, flat surface to put up a projection had been an issue; but since NIMH's perfection of the cube technology, one could now set up a 4-D home cinema in the middle of a forest if need be – if he had the money to afford it of course.

"We haven't had the time to debate over permanent names for these new bodies, so we've temporarily named them after the company and ship we represent: Nimh-Alpha and Nimh-Beta. The orbit of Beta around Alpha appears to be circular, rotating on its axis at a distance of 500,000 miles, through a period of 19 days, but without a tilt, unlike the Earth, which means it should have no seasons; however, the orbit of Alpha around Centauri-A is slightly elliptic, which makes up somewhat for Beta's circular orbit. In short, we should expect freezing winters and hot summers in its year cycle – which lasts 412 earthly days in comparison to our own 365. Also, any bodies of water down there undoubtedly experience a great tidal pull in its 398-day cycle – which lasts 26 hours in contrast to our own 24. It seems our calendars and watches will be useless down there, without serious adjustments." Finished with his part of the speech, Dr Schultz took the stand, to discuss the environment of Nimh-Beta.

"Although our analysis of the atmosphere of Beta indicates non-breathable conditions – mostly a mixture of carbon dioxide and nitrogen – there appears to be a high concentration of water vapour, possibly even large bodies of frozen liquid water on the surface. Also, there is a strong magnetosphere emitted by the planet's core and that of Alpha – enough to disrupt our instrument readout signals –, which, theoretically, makes the surface safe from the strong solar radiation of its larger sun – its _three_ suns actually; although orbiting only Centauri-A, B also shines on the day side and Proximal Centauri – the red dwarf of the star system – shines on the night side once a year, giving it a 26-hour day event yearly, which we've decided to mark as January 1st of the Nimh-Beta's year. Also, the presence of carbon and nitrogen – two of the key elements of living matter – support our theories of potential terraforming on that new planet. That leaves us with just putting the theory to the test…"

"And that concludes our lecture people," interrupted Commander Fitzgibbons, retaking the stand, "Now then, with regards to our mission, our schedule for the next 18 months is as follows: reach Nimh-Beta and set up base on its surface; for the duration of one year of the revised calendar, we will seed the surface with algae and bacteria, based on our FAO team's specifications, as well as document the environment in every detail, to determine, whether or not it can be successfully terraformed. All this information must be gathered and wrapped-up in a science package by the time we've rotated back, some six years from now…" Fitzgibbons went on with a long lecture on the code of discipline and responsibilities everyone was to meet, before coming to the bottom line: the next stage of their journey.

"There are two ways to reach Nimh-Beta: by firing up the ion engines again and going in a straight line - at the expense of more energy - would shorten the remainder of our journey to a few hours; or, we can use Hohmann's trajectory to slingshot around Centauri-A and rendezvous with Beta by joining the orbit of Alpha on the other side, within eleven weeks. Therefore, after due consideration, I have decided that we should take the longer route; this way, we will have the time to recuperate from stasis and prepare for our ground operations on Nimh-Beta." He called them at attention again.

"Lt Stacy, you are in charge of supervising Dr Schultz and Dr Stetson's space lab set-up and a full inspection of the bio-payload; Colonel Strauss, you are in charge of inspecting reactors, propulsion systems, and life support; Major Wilson, you and I are running a navigation review up on the bridge, to adjust our trajectory for Nimh Beta; Dr Boniface, you are in charge of setting up the med centre. And Captain Anderson, I expect a full report on the status of the pods – both manned and unmanned -, in preparation for our ground operations. I expect each of you at your stations within five minutes. That will be all. Dismissed!"

With their new schedule outlined and finalised, the crew of the _NIMH-1_ left to take up their respected posts as per their orders. As part of the ship's design, most of the onboard facilities, including the lab, greenhouse, infirmary, living quarters, and all supplies, were dismantled and stored in vacuum-sealed, shockproof lockers throughout the ship, leaving the interior clear of anything that wasn't part of the infrastructure, much like a brand new empty house, still deprived of furniture and utensils. These storage conditions were the only guaranteed way to protect their precious arsenal from damage caused by the massive g-forces of the firing ion drive. But that would soon change now that they were back on trajectory control, as they began unsealing lockers and setting up the equipment in their designated compartments.

The _NIMH-1_ itself was a disk-shaped starship – the underside a massive heat shield for atmospheric entry and aerobraking, with most of the crew areas housed inside an arched, rectangular structure protruding atop the central fuselage, forming the spine of the ship; with the bridge and avionics in the fore section, the ion drives and attitude thrusters were housed aft, divided by airtight bulkheads, which separated the different sections and compartments throughout the ship. In addition to its ion drives, the ship was fitted with four massive chemical rocket boosters, mounted on legs around the edges of the heat shield disk, like a giant spider; these would be used to control the landing of the 50,000-ton spacecraft on the new world, and would also function as an auxiliary PAM propulsion system by having the rocket tubes facing fore and aft, horizontally, when not in use for descent.

The interior of the _NIMH-1_ likewise was a state-of-the-art technological wonder, capable of sustaining her entire crew in the midst of deep space for up to 20 years without a resupply, yet a most strenuous environment indeed. The crew had been travelling for over four years already, but their real mission had only just began in earnest; now, ahead of them lay eleven restless weeks of rehab, filled with killing fitness sessions and an appalling diet of high-calcium-and-protein foodstuffs to regain bone and muscle mass lost while in stasis, not to mention heavy duty work under Fitzgibbons's monarchy-like leadership.

But otherwise, Josh and his crew were thrilled by the fact that very soon, they would be making history as the first human beings to set foot on a new world, light-years away from their home planet. What's more, if the algae they had brought along flourished on Nimh-Beta and turned its atmosphere breathable, then all of humanity would be taking a new step in its existence: its evolution on _two worlds_. Nimh-Beta would soon be a sister planet to Mother Earth…or so was the purpose of their mission.

**Author's note:** For those of you who are wondering, the ship's technology, as well as the astronomy described, are all based on real science and are applicable in theory. The names of the two new planets were originally Apocalypse and Pandora, like in my Watership Down fics, but then I decided on something original. Enjoy and please review!


	3. Chapter 3 Into the Storm

**Date: July 1****st**** 2076 Earth Time**

**Location: Orbit around Nimh Alpha**

**Mission Time: 56 Months, 2 Days, 13 Hours**

Josh lay on his bunk, reading. Being the EVA specialist, he had the least duties during the voyage, giving him plenty of leisure time. During these long periods, when he wasn't busy with his fitness sessions, or wasn't assisting his colleagues in their other duties, he'd devote his time mostly to reading or inspecting the pods in the launch bay, anxious for the day when he'd be flying them. Like a university scholar, he'd spend hours browsing through the endless archive of e-books, e-films and e-games in the ship's database, all of which were accessible via a terminal in his sleeping quarters.

His muscular trunk, heavily worked on over the past three months and finally restored to the peak of physical fitness it had been prior to departure, Josh was looking forward to taking up his real duties as the mission's EVA specialist. So far, aside from several brief EVAs to set up the rotating antenna array, which trailed aft of the ship, Commander Fitzgibbons had refrained from allowing any unnecessary outside ventures, in the interest of safety, which was quickly wearing down on Josh's patience.

Each crewmember of the _NIMH-1_ had his own private sleeping quarters, which had since been properly set up following the crew's awakening from stasis. The facilities included a zero-gravity bunk fitted with straps, a zero-gravity shower cubicle, a space latrine, several airtight lockers – a safety measure against damage or injury in the event of decompression – for stowing personal belongings, including one full-length one for his space suit, with transparent covers for better visibility.

In addition to their sleeping quarters, each crewmember had been issued an Astronaut's Handkit, which contained an old-fashioned dog-tag, bearing its owner's name, rank and identification number, which they were expected to wear throughout the entire duration of the mission, a space hygiene kit, an Apollo-style pen, a shock-proof, ever-running space watch, displaying a variety of time modes – including the day cycle of Nimh-Beta –, complete with a communications pager required aboard ship, as well as monitoring the vital functions of the wearer.

Finally, there was the self-issue access card, which allowed each person entry to restricted areas of the ship, and the HHC (HandHeld Computer) – a descendant of the common laptop -, a portable computer that could fold up in a tube like a window blind; entirely touch-operated and running on an ever-lasting atomic battery like the watch, this device was fitted with a navigational system, multiple environment analysis systems, a reference bank, and even a personal data bank for each astronaut (in Josh's case, he used it mainly to store his SatNet downloads he had brought from Earth).

Like the rest of his colleagues, Josh had set up his private little corner nicely. The shelves inside the transparent lockers, which were either magnetic surfaces or lined with hairy stick-patches for personal effects to stay in place in the event of the artificial gravity failing, held a number of Josh's prized possessions he had brought from Earth, to remind him of his homeland on this long voyage: several rare, worn-out printed copies of his favourite books, including _Watership Down_, _The Extraordinary Voyages of Jules Verne_, and an _SAS Survival Guide_, among others, his Manchester United football, some miniature models of British landmarks, and even an antique, multi-tool Swiss Army knife, which he had smuggled onboard.

At first glance, it seemed rather silly to bring such trinkets up here, given that they had the biggest, most advanced e-library ever made onboard, not to mention that printed media had become obsolete over thirty years ago, with portable data media also on the way. Since the launch of the Wireless World Wide Web called SatNet (a descendant of the Internet, housing all servers onboard hundreds of orbiting satellites), all databases, libraries, media stores, as well as all written material, from shopping receipts to books, had been made entirely digital, reducing the output of paper waste worldwide, as part of a major reforestation project. In this day and age, any of this old 'cluttering media' and all related technology could only be found in museums, private collections, or clearout e-stores, yet still remained popular mostly for aesthetic reasons.

Back on Earth, Josh had been president of the Obsolete World Revival Society in England, which focused on collecting and restoring such trinkets and artefacts, before everything had merged with cyberspace. It also taught obsolete hand skills to old-world geeks, in response to the appalling technologically-dependant ways of life emerging with every passing year. As such, he was one of the few people left in the world who could perform the Thousand-and-One applications of the Swiss Army knife perfectly, cook by hand, or generally manage long-term without the luxury of high-tech.

A number of fingernail-sized data storage microchips called _ADCs_ (All-Data-Chips) – a descendant of the old CDs, DVDs, Blu-Rays, and memory sticks – housing his SatNet collection, lay in a box on the edge of his bunk. Inserting them into USB-like slots on the edge of his HHC, he made himself comfortable, browsing through his family e-album he had brought from Earth. Beside him, on the bulkhead wall, his cabin's 3-D holographic screen displayed a countryside theme, complete with the background sounds of the breeze and birdsong, all so rich in detail and resolution, they could be mistaken for real. However, to Josh, the only real thing was in his old photos of the green fields of Hampshire he had known as a child, now quickly disappearing as a result of expending building and farmland brought about by overpopulation.

Touching the digital command keys on the HHC's flexible crystalline-fibre screen, he switched to his data bank, accessing a holographic representation of the Nimh system, detailing the orbits and compositions of the sister planets they would be calling home for the next two years. Staring at the nebulous atmosphere of the Nimh-Alpha mother planet, he spotted Nimh-Beta orbiting in the foreground, looking very different than when they had first sighted it three months ago.

The planet was now engulfed in a strange, vortex-like storm, resembling a cyclone, only in space, with the planet situated right in the centre of its eye. This storm seemed attached to the planet – or perhaps it originated from it – as it followed Nimh-Beta on its orbit around Alpha. Putting up the image in false colour, to pinpoint the electromagnetic anomalies, Nimh-Alpha resembled Jupiter, with Nimh-Beta and its storm sticking out like the Great Red Spot in the foreground.

According to Dr Stetson's observations, that peculiar phenomenon seemed to have some sort of yearly cycle, appearing briefly only once a year, when the Nimh system was in its closest proximity to Centauri-B. Assumingly, the solar winds emitted from this new star, which travelled at different frequencies than that of the Earth's, were causing some sort of electromagnetic interference by coming in contact with the unusually strong magnetosphere of the new world, triggering this storm cycle, probably from the disturbance of the ionisation in the Nimh-Beta's atmosphere, or whatever it was that was causing it.

Bored, he decided to take a stroll, check if everything was in order. Striding down the illuminated, white promenade deck, which run the full length of the crew areas, he made his way aft. The _NIMH-1_'s interior, excluding its disk-shaped underbelly, was roughly similar to that of a massive airliner: split into two levels, the ship was divided into fourteen major compartments that went in pairs, according to their purpose; the control room and avionics, the hibernation tank bay and life support, the Observation Room and living quarters, bio lab and hydroponics, the Resupply Modules and ground equipment bay, the EVA pod and Rover bay, and finally, the ion drive and Engineering compartment.

He paused outside the lab, admiring the amazing transformation the place had undergone since the crew had taken up their duties eleven weeks ago. The space lab was all cluttered with state-of-the-art equipment, strapped onto worktables, bolted to the floor; illuminated monitors and control panels lined just about every inch of the bulkhead walls, displaying data, while the _NIMH-1_'s science team, their HHCs in hand, went about their work.

Drs Schultz and Stetson, in contrast to Josh, had been extremely busy over the past few weeks. Sitting in a number of Plexiglas tanks were the fruits of their recent labours: a dozen rodent kits – mice and rats alike –, genetically engineered from the onboard embryonic stocks. Schultz had reported that the cryostorage payload was intact, so Fitzgibbons had given the order that a number of specimens be prepared to use for their onboard experiments; more of them, including other larger species, would also be cloned back into existence once they had set up base on Nimh-Beta, to use in their panspermia projects.

In the greenhouse next door, flourishing seedlings and vegetables were growing nicely on their compost-filled trays and garden pots, as well as several tanks of nutrient-enriched water filled with thriving blue-green algae, bubbling with oxygen emissions. Large air ducts, lined with huge motor fans, drew all that precious oxygen into the ship's life support systems, topping up the air supply.

This stuff, Josh knew, would soon be placed in sterile payload containers mounted on the ship's unmanned probes, which would go around seeding these life-giving organisms, which should theoretically photosynthesise and eventually create an atmosphere they could breathe. According to Dr Schultz, if the project was successful, within one generation – roughly the same time it had taken for industry to poison the Earth -, Nimh-Beta would resemble a virgin Earth, ready to be colonised and developed.

Passing through an airlock bulkhead, Josh entered his parts of the ship – the pod launch bay. Fitted out like a massive space garage, the hanger resembled the deck of an aircraft carrier, crowded with manned and unmanned probes alike. He stared with pride at the REMO (Resupply Module), a massive, can-shaped probe similar to the old Dragons used on the ISS, designed to deliver a HAB Package – a payload of supplies and equipment, and even a Rover - to the surface of the planet, to set up an outpost in a distant location away from Home Base, where the panspermia proved most productive.

The unmanned pods called the TEMs (Terraforming and Exploration Modules) were spider-shaped, resembling the old Lunar Modules from the days of the Apollo missions. Each of these automated vehicles, aside from its payload container mounted beneath the heat shield, were fitted with a science instrument package mounted on a mini-Rover, capable of monitoring the Nimh-Beta's environment for up to 50 years on its solar power supply and atomic batteries; the payload container itself was linked up to fertilizer cannons mounted onto the probe's robotic limbs, which would squirt the mess, delivering the first seeds of life to the alien planet.

The manned pods called the SRVs (Scouting and Reconnaissance Vehicles), or Scouts for short, were also beauties in their own way: shaped like the old Gemini modules, only with wings, these atomic-powered, mini-ion-drive-propelled spacecraft were the latest breakthrough in EVA flight. Titanium shell, lined with heat shielding, the one-man cockpit had a life support system for up to 72 hours, including water and emergency rations, a state-of the-art navigation and communication unit, and a manoeuvring system capable of handling even the most dangerous of space acrobatics. In addition, it performed just as well in atmospheric flight, by means of its supersonic jet vents, designed for that purpose.

He looked up at the hanger roof above his head, which was designed like that of the old Space Shuttle's, capable of opening in flight or at ground level, for him and his crew to go scouting the skies of their new home at their leisure. At that moment, he was caught off-guard by an announcement on the intercom.

"_Lunch served in the mess hall in five minutes."_

Although attending meals was not compulsory, Commander Fitzgibbons always liked to go by the book, to make sure their food rations lasted until the return voyage, in the event that the vegetable garden didn't survive. Therefore, with the exception of water and any snacks anyone kept from his meal tray, delayed meals or in-between snacks were not permitted. And if something didn't bode well with a deep-space astronaut on a long mission, aside from being confined to the interior of his ship for too long, was an empty stomach. He hurried back up the promenade deck, to the mess hall.

The mess hall, like all the facilities onboard, was designed to be as technology-dependant as possible, which in turn, omitted the posts of any unnecessary crewmembers, like mess stewards or cooks, thus ensuring more mission time for the rest.

Sharing one long table with rotating leather chairs, which, like all of the ship's furnishings, were bolted to the floor as a precaution against explosive decompression, the crew got their meals in self-service fashion. By running their access cards through a slot, the automated food provider would present each person with the meal tray bearing his name, complete with dishes and cutlery. The dishes were loaded by computer with a meal in the form of wrapped, freeze-dried rations, including appetizer, main course, dessert and even drink.

Each person picked up his tray and, in an orderly manner, took turns using the rehydrater – a contraption similar to an electric kettle –, which pumped small quantities of hot water through straws puncturing the tinfoil wrappings of the MREs. Their freeze-dried contents, which had been cleansed of every last particle of water upon production, preserving them in a way so that they remained eternally fresh, ended their time-freeze hibernation, and were soon transformed back into steaming curries and stews, pickled fruit, icy sweets, and frothing drinks.

The only thing they lacked was hard liquor, which was explicitly forbidden in space flight. Some of them had tried smuggling hip flasks of alcohol onboard, which had been confiscated and returned empty, encouraging Dr Boniface and Josh to set up an illegal still in the lab, using freeze-dried potatoes to make moonshine vodka, only to be caught by Lt Stacy, who had ordered the still disassembled but had let them keep their vodka, and even kept quiet about it to Fitzgibbons, under the condition that the stuff remained under lock and key until they landed on Nimh-Beta.

Topping up his tray with a cool water pouch from the icebox, Josh joined his companions at the lunch table. With the exception of Commander Fitzgibbons, who always ate in silence like a robot, often reading the schedule on his HHC, the crew of the _NIMH-1_ always had stories to trade.

"…I am telling you, Dr Valentine did a too-good-a-job on those hybrids he had us bring up here," said Dr Schultz, "I have been observing extraordinary behaviour in the animals, especially the rats, over the past few weeks. It is almost as they have some sort of intelligence of their own, which is growing with their maturity…"

"Well, they are gene-spliced, chromosome-enhanced, some even with human brain cell genes," said Dr Boniface as a matter-of-factly, with a slight frown of disapproval, "Our entire payload is a 'fancy' state-of-the-art biosphere in a bottle, bio-engineered to adapt and flourish in the most hostile of environments. Darwin's theory of evolution goes straight out the window… Genetic perversion of this kind is bound to yield some unforeseen results. You know the old saying: 'never screw with Mother Nature…'" At that moment, the conversation was interrupted by Commander Fitzgibbons.

"All right, gentlemen…_and_ lady," he added hastily, referring to Lieutenant Stacy, who cleared her throat incredulously at not being acknowledged, "Listen up. As you all know, we successfully entered Nimh-Alpha's orbit yesterday. The time has come to think about the next stage of our mission: our landing on Nimh-Beta. Unfortunately, we hadn't counted on this storm sitting between us and our destination, when Mission Control drew up our original flight plan. So, if you can please finish up and follow me to the Observation Room for briefing."

Hastily shoving down the last of his freeze-dried ice cream and pocketing his rehydrated Dr Pepper for later, Josh followed his colleagues up to the Observation Room. Since their first meeting here, the crew of the _NIMH-1_ had continued using the 4-D holographic projection dome regularly, mostly for scientific observations conducted by the Science Team, and even for entertainment evenings when they'd take turns putting up movies, turning the place into a space cinema. Some others, like Commander Fitzgibbons, even used this unique system to get daily reports on mission status.

To make using the ship's database from this room easier, NIMH had added a final touch by installing an artificial intelligence figure to manage the database via voice control, known as OWL. Like its name, OWL was a holographic figure of a white owl – an embodiment of the NIMH Cooperation logo, symbolising wisdom and knowledge, as well as Dr Valentine's pet, after which it was modelled – complete with visual and verbal capabilities, who could interact with the crew almost like a living being, and with full access to the ship's database.

Fitzgibbons stepped up to the domed screen and cleared his throat. The blank, grey screen sprang to life, revealing the form of a gigantic owl, standing in a snoozing position. At the sound of Fitzgibbons' voice, the creature's luminous eyes opened wide, bending over to get a good look at them, the creature's resolution so high and rich in detail, some of the crew cringed slightly, forcibly reminding themselves that it was just fake A.I. and harmless.

"_Greetings Commander Fitzgibbons,"_ said OWL, nodding respectfully, _"How may I be of assistance?"_

"Good afternoon OWL," replied Fitzgibbons, returning the greeting, "Please update us on our revised flight plan for landing." OWL nodded and stretched out its wings wide; the image disappeared and the screen morphed into another planetarium model of the Nimh system, with lines marking the trajectory of the _NIMH-1_, for its upcoming landing on Nimh-Beta. While a red dot, marking the position of the ship, moved along the trajectory line, OWL provided voice-over details on the simulation.

"_The crew uses the gravitational pull of Nimh-Beta to break free of their orbit around Alpha, and goes into orbit around the new world; as soon as trajectory is established, an SRV is launched to map the unseen terrain beneath the storm, and then report back with a data package…"_ The crew looked excitedly at each other; ever since sighting their destination, there had been bets placed on who would be the first person to set foot on the new world and now it seemed Josh would be getting that honour.

The Marine pilot smiled, reflecting back to the people whose footsteps he was bound to follow: Neil Armstrong had been the first man on the Moon; Commander Fitzgibbons had been the first man on Mars as a young man on his first mission, and now he was going to be the first man on Nimh-Beta. He rolled his eyes at the thought of the ticket tape parade when they rotated home; he – or rather _they'd_ – have so many fans wanting a piece of them, so much publicity to cope with, their lives would no longer be their own. They quietened down, watching the simulation zoom in onto a full-scale, cutout model of the ship itself, showing her pods being launched and descending towards the planet.

"_Once re-entry flight path is charted, Operation Aphrodite can commence: first, the TEMs are launched and automatically set down on their designated landing sites, delivering their bio-payloads; the REMO will be placed in stationary orbit, on standby, until the TEMs can determine best seeding location to set up outpost." _Operation Aphrodite, named after the Greek goddess of agriculture, was the code name of their upcoming panspermia operation on Nimh-Beta, when their unmanned pods would seed the algae throughout the surface, while the landers monitored and maintained these unmanned plantation sites throughout the rest of the mission.

"_The NIMH-1 herself will then be brought in for landing; the PAM (Payload Assist Module) rockets installed in her undercarriage will be used for aerobreaking and set her down on the Nimh-Beta's surface. Ground EVAs and FAOs can then commence…"_ They watched as the simulation showed the ship jettisoning her antenna array, which would remain in orbit, to be used as a weather and navigation satellite, before the _NIMH-1_ plunged into the atmosphere, heat shield belly first, her massive descent rockets extending on four limbs like a spider, providing counterthrust and guiding her through a gradual descent onto the barren surface of the new world.

The briefing complete, the crew of the _NIMH-1_ cheered; soon, their moment of glory would be at hand. All their training, hardships and years of preparation for this mission would finally yield its rewards. Commander Fitzgibbons however, as it often happens with toffee-nosed, iron-fisted COs, found the perfect moment to crash the party – and in this case, it was Josh whom he'd be spoiling things for.

"Since we have no way of knowing the full nature of that mysterious storm sitting in our flight path – our instruments have been unable to properly interpret their readings and determine the risk factors -, I am afraid we shall have to take certain precautions to ensure the mission isn't placed in jeopardy; instead of sending out a manned Scout, we will be using a TEM to penetrate the storm and take SAR footage of the surface." Josh felt his jaw tighten; did Fitzgibbons just enjoy making his life miserable or was he just jealous that Josh was one of the best pilots in the world, while he had always been a home base Commander who had never sprouted wings in his life?

"I have been consulting with flight engineer Strauss and he's confirmed that the TEM's sample return module can be recalled from the surface, bringing back the data we need to chart our flight path with…" Josh had heard enough and interrupted Fitzgibbons' monologue.

"Excuse me sir, but if you don't mind me saying so, this would be nothing but a complete waste of time…"

Fitzgibbons frowned in annoyance at the interruption, much less happy with Josh questioning his plans, as he coolly replied, without looking at him, "Son, we have standard protocols to follow and safety is our first priority in the book…"

_More like you being a real pain-in-the-ass actually_, Josh thought grimly, yet refrained from saying it out loud, knowing it could mean old Iron-Fist taking away his wings before he even got started. "I am well aware of the regulations sir, but surely, sometimes, only with a bit of risk can anything hope to be gained…" Fitzgibbons however, realising where Josh was getting at, would hear none of it.

"No manned flights, period," he snapped, "We start by sending out an unmanned probe. Then, if it's safe, maybe we'll talk about a pilot. That's how it's going to be." Josh, thoroughly annoyed by now, retorted sharply.

"You need someone out there who can actually think sir, not some dumb probe flight computer," he snapped irritably, "Why don't you just allow me to do my job…?"

"Your job, Captain Anderson, is to carry out my orders, when and how I expect you to!" barked Fitzgibbons, glaring at Josh's impudence, his expression spelling something along the lines of _'If you don't shut up and do as you're told, you're on report!'_ Josh held his tongue, letting his Commander cool off.

"Now then," Fitzgibbons continued, after they had both calmed down, ignoring the reproachful looks from the rest of his crew, "I want everybody at their stations; Captain Anderson, you and Captain Strauss get TEM-1 ready; launch at 16:00. The rest of you, I want you at your stations up on the bridge, setting up Mission Control. Dismissed!"

Half an hour later, Josh, along with flight engineer Strauss, had prepared their first unmanned probe for launch. Although technically just a disposable payload transportation module, the probe was designed to run fully automated for years, using mounted solar panels to recharge the lander's batteries and keeping the Science Package running, as well as adjustable in a thousand different ways, to accommodate every likely scenario. Josh could remember one particular contingency that Strauss had told him about when they had first cast eyes on the modules during mission training.

"_In the event of an emergency, in which the ship is destroyed or unable to make the return voyage, the probes can be rigged as evacuation pods, by swapping the payload container with a hibernation tank; the probe, in contrast to the manned modules, is fitted with an ion-drive, like the mother ship, and capable of making the return journey on their own, transporting a survivor in hibernation. That's why there is an exact number of modules onboard as there are crewmembers." _

Strauss had finished modifying the payload container; in this case, rather than housing trays of algae to be seeded, the interior had been fitted with a Science Package, complete with a small six-wheel Rover for ground scouting, wired up to the probe's flight computer and high-gain antenna, from where it'd transmit its data feed in flight.

From a small control room beside the airlock, McEwen charted the flight path, which would send it in a circle around the planet's equator, until the SAR located some favourable landing sight. There, the probe would land automatically using its first set of single-use rocket engines mounted on its descent stage, deploy the Rover to take instrument readings on the ground, and then kick off the planet using its primary mini-ion-drive mounted under the payload container, bringing back its precious data package for analysis.

With the probe all set and ready for launch, the men left the hanger and returned to the airlock; the bulkhead doors were sealed, the hanger depressurised and the artificial gravity dimmed; the little pod, free from its moorings, rose slowly from the floor by means of its attitude-control thrusters, and out the open hanger roof, preparing for blastoff.

Meanwhile, Josh joined the rest of his colleagues at the respected stations on the bridge. The flight deck of the _NIMH-1_ was a spacious, dome-shaped compartment, like the Observation Room, only smaller, and lined with windshield windows, facing out the nose of the ship into the star-strewn horizon. With the exception of the floor and windows, every inch of the place was taken up by instrument stations and control panels, controlling and monitoring every last function of the ship, from the emergency lights to the ion drives.

Ten heavily padded pilot's g-chairs, each marked with the name of the crewmember assigned to it, stood in a half-circle, before each designated station. Only Fitzgibbons and Lt Stacy sat separately from the rest, before a massive pilot's console in the centre of the room, facing the windshield. Josh's own seat, the least important station on the ship, was located in a far corner, close to the entrance, leading aft.

Sliding his hand across the security touch pad, to open the glass slide-down door of the bridge, designed for mutiny control, Josh hurried up to his station. Most of the instruments were operated by touch-screens mounted on the consoles, with OWL's voice providing voiceover feedback on system readings and status; however, some of the sub-systems and emergency overrides were still operated the old-fashioned way from hand-operated control panels.

Josh's screen showed the pod leaving the hanger, his instruments charting its trajectory and feeding the data into the pod's flight computer; grabbing the joystick on the armrest, from where he'd be operating the pod by remote, Josh punched in the ignition sequence. On Fitzgibbons' command, the pod's boosters fired and it shot off towards the storm-engulfed planet circling the gas giant they were orbiting. At the surveillance and communications station, data feeds from the Science Package appearing on Major Wilson's screens, everything reading green across the board.

At first, it seemed everything was going like clockwork as the little pod neared the edge of the storm, preparing to penetrate; then, suddenly, a red indication appeared on the navigation screen. The moving dot, which marked the pod travelling along its plotted trajectory, had swayed off-course for no apparent reason.

"We're getting interference sir," called Wilson from the navigator's station, fiddling with his instrument panels, struggling to retain the pod's dying signal, distorted by the storm's electromagnetic pulses, "Pod is going off-vector!"

"Bring it up on the scope!" barked Fitzgibbons. Wilson furiously tapped some controls, lowering a large see-through screen from its slot on the bridge ceiling, displaying a periscope view of the horizon, zooming in on the pod entering the storm. They could see massive electrical discharges occurring as the skin of the craft came in contact with that super-powerful ball of static electricity floating in the heavens, before it vanished from view.

"Captain Anderson, take her off autopilot and try manual abort," ordered Fitzgibbons, cursing under his breath. Josh obeyed but found his controls inoperative.

"She's not responding sir," he muttered, fiddling with the control stick to alter trajectory, none of his commands getting across, much less receiving any feedback from the probe, "The signal is breaking up; she must be out of control…" Then followed a complete loss-of-signal reading, popping up on every screen:

**WARNING!**

_TEM-1_ TRAJECTORY TERMINATED:

LOSS OF SIGNAL

"That's it sir, we've lost her," Lt Stacy said, sighing in disappointment. Josh couldn't suppress a smirk; as he always said, Fitzgibbons tended to put too much faith in his precious machines. He could now see his Mission Commander out of the corner of his eye, his lip quivering with silent anger, looking ready to drive his fist through the pilot's console in frustration. However, he managed to maintain his composure, as he raised his hand, cutting off any protests from his crew.

"For now, we just sit tight and wait," he snapped, "The pod is programmed to return to the ship automatically; if it got across the storm, it might still complete her mission." Josh, hearing this over his intercom unit, rolled his eyes.

_That damn probe is history Fitzgibbons_, he thought, _You need human initiative to tackle a storm like that…_ Suddenly, a wild idea hit him; quickly glancing at his panel, he saw the pod bay was still open. The idea was beyond crazy, but this might be his chance of proving his worth to Fitzgibbons, rather than to go on sitting, rotting at a control station where he didn't belong.

Carefully transferring the probe's charted flight plan into the flight computer of one of the Scouts, he turned to Wilson, "Take over for a moment; I am going to run some sequences on another pod, to check maybe we messed up something in the checklist…" Without waiting for an acknowledgement, he rose from his chair and hurried aft.

Pausing outside Fitzgibbons' deserted sleeping quarters, decorated up like a science museum, with models and trinkets of every space mission in history lining the shelves, as well as leather-bound tomes of science encyclopaedias and other luxury books, he saw luck was with him; in his excitement to see this show on the road, the Commander had forgotten to lock away the box containing the safety keys that released the modules from their grounding moorings – another mutiny-control system.

Grabbing the key for Alpha Scout, he hurried to his own quarters, to suit up; hitting the control button beside his suit locker, it opened and his brand-new space suit slid out on a clothes hanger. Space suit technology had certainly advanced a great deal since the Apollo era; completely vacuum-ballooning proof, and light enough to be worn even in Earth's gravity, his suit was yet another feat of remarkable engineering and technology used onboard the _NIMH-1_.

The full-body pressure uniform was made of soft, non-elastic fabrics, divided into airtight, thermal, and radiation-shielding layers, for protection against the hazards of outer space, and painted in a bright red for better visibility. To prevent pressure breaches, the joints were made hard, like a suit of armour, including the kneecaps, elbows, shoulders, boots, neck collar and visor. The suit's jetpack and controls were mounted on the HUT (Hard Upper Torso) vest assembly; the life support and power supply were wrapped in a backpack hanging over the shoulders, while all the systems and instruments were controlled by a touch-screen microcomputer attached to the right sleeve, as well as the HHC, which each astronaut carried in a holster across the chest plate. For manoeuvrability in space, the wearer had an armrest-style attitude thruster assembly, worn around his waist, complete with control sticks on each side.

Equipped with a visual-and-audio radio, inferred beacon, LED spotlights, a bio-med monitoring system, EVA instrument package (environment analyser, life support monitor, navigational aid, camera, etc), the suit had a life support duration of up to 72 hours, including emergency backup, a threshold endurance of up to 1,000 degrees Celsius and down to the absolute zero of space, by means of thermal batteries and a nitrogen cooling system. The additional utilities included a 1-litre water reservoir, a space diaper, an in-built toolkit for minor repairs and the geological survey, overall allowing each crew member comfortable, if not luxurious, working conditions in the most hostile of environments.

As he disassembled the suit to put it on, he heard Fitzgibbons utter the stinging words on his intercom, _"That's it, I am not wasting another pod. Shut down all launch operations; we are going to wait for the storm to clear and then we can try again…"_

_Old Iron-Fist wants to keep us floating in orbit for the next several weeks because he doesn't want to be proven wrong about my flying abilities; we shall see about that… _

With no time to don the suit following the usual 30-minute checklist, Josh discarded the non-essential components including the underclothing, space diaper, thruster assembly and most of the medical sensors, and slipped into the suit's zip opening, still wearing his service uniform. Grabbing his HUT and visor, he hurried out, towards the pod bay. How much time did he have before Fitzgibbons realised what he was up to? Although they couldn't stop him once he had launched, they could still seal up the hanger before he got there. If he was going to go ahead with this little escapade, he'd better hurry.

He had almost made it to the airlock, fully suited up, when he ran into Dr Boniface, who had been busy in the medical bay, vaccinating Dr Schultz's hybrid rodents for the lab. No sooner had Boniface gathered up the box of ampoules Josh has knocked out of his hands, when he saw his colleague suited up for an unauthorised EVA.

"Josh, what's all this? Where do you think you're going?"

Without any time to explain or argue, Josh grabbed his friend and mentor by the shoulders, "Gordon, if you're a true friend, then pretend you didn't just see me and keep your mouth shut. This is something I have to do." Although shocked by Josh's intentions, Boniface's mutual dislike of Fitzgibbons won out and he nodded.

"You watch yourself out there lad; I don't need a casualty on my plate so early in the mission." As Josh hurried to the airlock, he muttered with a smile, "Good luck, Joshua, you crazy son of a bitch…"

Hurrying into the launch bay's control room, Josh inserted the arming key and activated the launch sequence for Alpha Scout. Looking outside the hanger's observation window, he saw the familiar red lights blinking on the hanger floor beside the module, indicating it was ready for launch.

Sealing his suit, he stepped into the airlock, depressurised it, and stepped out into the vacuum launch bay, still open to the sky above. With the artificial gravity disengaged in this compartment, Josh hurryingly hopped across the hanger using the magnetic soles of his boots like a rabbit, past the empty pedestal of the lost TEM-1, towards the row of Scouts waiting moored at the far end.

Opening up the cockpit cover of Alpha Scout, Josh climbed onboard. Pressurising the cockpit and wiring up his suit to the module's computer and life support, he initiated the pre-launch sequence he had practiced so many times in the simulators during training, his flying instincts taking over as he set his controls for launch.

The Scout's cramped, single-person cockpit, as well as the spacecraft's performance as a whole, was not unlike to that of the old Harriers he used to fly as a trainee pilot, only featuring similar state-of-the-art, high-tech controls and avionics as the mother ship. The pilot's console was another touch-screen, capable of displaying various readings by request, as well as controlling the majority of the module's key systems. Two control sticks on the edge of the g-couch armrests controlled the pitch and trim of the craft, while some other smaller, manual-control consoles operated the multiple auxiliary systems. While for an amateur, all these complicated controls would seem impossible to handle, for a professional flyboy like Josh, it was a cinch, part of his very instinct.

In an instant, he had power, the engines and avionics all functioning at full capacity. Doing one final checklist, he strapped himself in and hit the release switch; the mooring arms disengaged as the small, attitude correction thrusters in the pod's underbelly fired, raising the craft skyward, out of the hanger just before the launch bay hatch closed up. Someone on the bridge had obviously picked up the launch sequence signal by now and could track his Scout's transponder signal, as he suddenly heard the furious shouting of Commander Fitzgibbons calling to him…

Meanwhile, back on the bridge, the crew of the _NIMH-1_ sat, reflecting on their difficult position; the TEM-1 was lost, indicating that the storm circling their destination planet was impassable. As it stood, they had no choice but to remain in orbit around the new world until the storm cleared, which might not happen for weeks or months. The prospects of finally getting out of this hamster cage they had been living in for the past 4,5 years were shattered by Commander Fitzgibbons' firm, unwavering determination to always go by the book. So it came as a great surprise to all of them when Colonel Strauss noticed a new signal suddenly appear on the screen of Josh's unoccupied station.

"Sir, Alpha Scout has launched!"

Fitzgibbons, who was sitting as if in a trance, was instantly on his feet, looking outside the bridge windows. Sure enough, he saw the modules glide away from the ship, heading towards the storm. Swearing, he put on his headset and ordered McEwen to put Alpha Scout on the box.

"Alpha Scout, what the hell are you doing? Your flight is not authorized!" They all listened as Captain Anderson's smirking voice responded.

"_Well, no shit Sherlock! But at least, now I am doing my proper job!"_ Fitzgibbons looked like he had swallowed a road grader. Ignoring his crew, who were cheering at Josh standing up to their tyrant Commander like that, he growled back across the line.

"I swear you'll never fly again! Now you bring that thing back here at once, you insubordinate lunatic!"

"_I will sir, as soon as I've done what NIMH sent me up here to do on this mission,"_ came Josh's defiant voice, _"Like I said sir, never put your faith in a bunch of computers to do a man's job."_ Fitzgibbons' expression resembled someone who had just realised he had been using sandpaper for toilet paper, his mind set on making sure that loose cannon of a flyboy out there would be court-martialled and stripped off his wings for good when they returned to Earth.

With no way to stop Josh now, the crew turned back to their stations, monitoring the flight path of the manned module, silently praying that Josh's famed flying skills would prove to be more than a match for that strange electromagnetic vortex that had swallowed up the unmanned pod.

It wasn't long before they saw the same interference interrupt Alpha-Scout's data feed; the module also started swaying off-course and then back, which they figured was Josh, also realising the problem, and attempting to correct the trajectory manually. They all froze, realising he was in trouble.

Utterly horrified, Fitzgibbons picked up his headset again, "Captain Anderson, abort! I repeat, abort immediately…! Captain Anderson, acknowledge!" Although furious at Josh for that display, one thing that Old Iron-Fist hated more than insubordination was losing someone on his watch. But his words only travelled out into the empty vastness of the universe, where Josh had vanished forever…

**Author's note:** Coming up next, Josh lands on Nimh-Beta and his adventures begin in earnest. Also, there will be the introduction of NIMH canon characters. ENJOY AND PLEASE REVIEW!


	4. Chapter 4 Planet of the Rats

**Date: July 1****st**** 2076 Earth Time**

**Location: Orbit around Nimh-Beta**

**Mission Time: 56 Months, 2 Days, 16 Hours**

Josh piloted his module away from the mother ship, heading towards the storm engulfing Nimh-Beta, where the unmanned pod had vanished. Although a little voice in the back of his head kept telling him what a crazy thing he was doing and the consequences that were bound to come of it – best case scenario, one hell of a disciplinary action from Fitzgibbons; worst case, go the same way as that pod – he was finally free, and back where he belonged.

Like most astronauts, to ensure his place on the mission, Josh had withheld the true intention of coming all the way out here from the Astronaut Corps psychologist, during evaluation sessions: to experience the ultimate freedom of space flight. Throughout his career, neither rank nor pay had ever been of much interest to him; only the sheer wonder of being master of the skies, to get away from the wretched world the Earth had become, even for a short while, was his heart's desire. And now, his ultimate dream had finally been fulfilled; he was master of the _universe_, infinity stretching out as far as the eye could see, in every direction. He was free. And that alone would sure be worth the dressing-down Fitzgibbons would be giving him the moment he returned to base.

His hands grasping the control sticks on his seat's armrests, Josh fired up the ion boosters, causing the pod to instantly accelerate to tens of times the speed of sound, using his thrusters to control pitch, roll and yaw. Ignoring the familiar pressure of the g-forces against his chest, he set course for the storm. On the aft camera view on his control screen, he saw the _NIMH-1_ vanishing in the distance as he left it behind him; through his canopy windshield, the storm loomed closer and closer on the horizon. He had no visual beyond those spectacular, electric-blue, cyclone-like vortexes, illuminated by occasional electrical discharges; but he knew, just beyond that storm of plasma bursts and electromagnetic pulses was the surface of Nimh-Beta, waiting for him. A whole new planet was his for the taking and nobody – not Commander Fitzgibbons, not NIMH, not God himself – would deprive him of that honour now.

Setting his instruments, he approached the storm, orbiting the planet from a distance of some 80,000 miles, looking for a good spot to penetrate. His flight screen, already jumbled by distorted instrument readings, revealed severe turbulence and dangerous electromagnetic pulses in those plasma clouds below, with readings way exceeding the maximum safety limits of the pod's design. Although built with the strongest, non-magnetic metal alloys in existence, with multiple layers of protection against all natural hazards ever recorded on Earth, penetrating directly through there would be suicide; what he needed was the reasonably smooth passage through the eye, or heart, often found in vortex storms like this one.

It didn't take him long to spot a particularly favourable-looking eye on the edge of the Northern Hemisphere, close to the planet's equator. The vortex forming around it was over 2,000 miles in diameter with a mere 50-mile-wide eye visible in its centre. While the chances of spotting it from the mother ship, 300,000 miles away, would have been unlikely, much less by the unmanned probe, which's automated flight instruments had undoubtedly been interrupted from all that interference, probably sending the probe flying blindly into that electromagnetic inferno, where it must have been reduced to atoms, for him it was a cinch.

_Technology has had its turn and lost; time to put the human factor to the test_, thought Josh, feeling mighty pleased with himself, for someone about to gamble with his life. With the ease and skill of an experienced pianist running his hands over the keys of his instrument at the opera house, he set his controls to default mode – in which the flight computer would automatically intervene should things get out of hand, but otherwise, not interfere with Josh's instinctual manoeuvring – and plotted his flight path through the eye. Panning into the eye with his SAR, where the reception was somewhat clearer, he picked up some scrappy images of the planet's surface below.

Doing a final quick checklist, he adjusted his attitude and flew straight towards the centre of the eye, careful to avoid the swift moving plasma clouds of the surrounding storm. Over the radio, he heard Fitzgibbons' broken voice once again, distorted by static, urging him to turn back; it seemed they too were having problems tracking him because of the storm and were worried he was about to go the same way as the unmanned pod. But it was too late to turn back now. He had a job to do.

Throttling up his boosters to full power, he flew deep into the eye; he could see the gigantic plasma bursts and electrical discharges of the storm flashing all around him, as if he were surrounded by a mob of reporters with cameras. Only these seemingly insignificant 'camera flashes', he knew, were deadly bursts of energy, thousands of kilowatts strong, and just as hot, making the pod look like a helpless fly caught in the spark-gap of an old Marconi telegraph about to spark. But Josh didn't have time to worry about the danger; his job was to face it and tackle it.

Just as he thought everything was going to go like clockwork, trouble struck; the plasma bursts, which, a minute ago, had been several miles away from him, were suddenly closing in on him from all around; it was almost as if the pod was somehow _attracting_ all that energy outside like a lighting conductor – except the pod wasn't 'grounded' anywhere, and a discharge from one of those balls of super-concentrated energy hitting the skin of the fuselage, with the atomic engines and fuel cells tucked beneath it, could make him literally glow like a new star.

_What the hell? Why isn't the magnetic shielding holding up?_ thought Josh, bewildered by this strange phenomenon. But, whatever was going on, he wasn't just going to sit around until those deadly bursts got him. Switching back to manual control, he took evasive action, using every ounce of combat flying skill he had, to dodge the attacking plasma bursts coming at him like supersonic ballistic missiles, threatening to flash-vaporize him in a super-blast of electrical discharge. But they were too many of them and too swift-moving for him to dodge for long…

Before he knew what was happening, one particularly large burst materialised out of nowhere and found him head-on; despite his space sunglasses, which were designed to allow the wearer to stare directly at a solar eclipse for hours without harming his eyes, the flash of the ensuing discharge was so bright, for an instant it had Josh lost in the darkness of flash-blindness. Struggling to shake off the blindness, he felt a wave of turbulence shake his pod, followed by massive g-forces; regaining his eyesight, he realised the pod had gone into a barbecue-roll, spinning wildly on its nose like a top, as it plummeted straight into the vortex's powerful gravity field, like a chunk of space debris sucked down a black hole.

Fighting the urge to black out from the massive velocity, feeling his blood leaking freely from his nose and ears as a result of the massive gravity forces hitting his body, Josh struggled to regain control of his spacecraft. But it was no use. The ship was completely out of control and at the mercy of this massive force carrying it along, none of the controls responding at all.

Using every ounce of self-control to remain calm and think, Josh activated his distress beacon, and tuned his radio to the SOS band, "Mayday, mayday! Repeat, mayday! This is _Alpha Scout_ to _NIMH-1_, declaring an emergency! Pod is out of control; request emergency procedures guidelines. Does anybody copy…?" But there was no answer. Like a toy boat caught in the whirlpool of the bathtub, the pod was sucked into the vortex, travelling at the speed of a bullet, the titanium hull turning red-hot from the electric charges hitting it without end, much like an overloaded power cable about to fuse.

His instruments all dancing like mad, the klaxon alarm blaring like mad in warning of incorrect attitude, danger of stress damage, and instrument malfunctions, and with no way to regain control, Josh clung to his seat, feeling the pressure of the building g-forces threatening to rip his ship apart at any second; that is if all this energy didn't find a weak spot in the hull shielding first and cause the module to explode. In spite of his apparent doom, it dawned on him that even if his vaporized remains were scattered into space, he would still be getting his wish: to die as an aviator in action.

Just as he felt himself about to sink into unconsciousness, the ride was over; without warning, the pod shot out the other side of the vortex, clearing the storm. His head spinning from concussion and his vision obscured from his own blood staining his visor plate, he struggled to get back his bearings. As he recovered, he realised he was heading straight towards the new planet; only a few hundred miles beneath him, stretched a bed of clouds and the gassy glow of an atmosphere. The pod, now underpowered from the storm blackout, was drifting straight towards it at a dangerously steep angle, threatening to burn up upon entry.

Hastily turning back to his controls, his instruments still giving irregular readings from the crashed flight computer, and with the craft only running on emergency power, Josh hurryingly rebooted the pod's primary unit, cutting as many unnecessary edges as possible, accessing the damage. If he couldn't get it going again on time, to correct his attitude before he hit, he'd either burn up in his uncontrollable descent or else skip off the atmosphere like a pebble on a pond, casting him out into deep space forever, where he could only expect a slow, lingering death from freezing. Even now, he could feel the cockpit starting to freeze without the pilot heating online; his suit's thermal battery was only rated for a few hours, after which the suit would fair no better than an English raincoat against an Antarctic winter.

Although the Scout had performed remarkably well against the wrath of that storm, nature hadn't been too kind on her; aside from a complete systems crash, the communication and navigation arrays were fried, as well as most external sensors, rendering most of the wireless instruments useless. The attitude thrusters, control system, and power supply were fortunately still functioning, allowing enough control for manual flight, yet there was no telling how long they would hold out. And then there was the issue of the stress damage the hull had sustained going through that vortex. Could it survive a re-entry?

Although the integrity reading was fortunately still in the green, Josh knew from past experience that a violent shock like this could cause serious unseen wear to the fuselage, particularly the heat shielding, which could cause it to give way during re-entry. To make matters worse, the excessive g-forces had triggered the emergency shut-off switch in three of the four engines; a system designed to automatically disable the engines to prevent their atomic fuel rods from self-destructing. With only one engine left to manoeuvre with, and with his pod barely holding together, an emergency landing was inevitable.

With half his avionics still down and with the primary systems running on the minimum hardware, Josh barely managed to regain control in time to correct the attitude, aligning his heat shield with the atmosphere, preparing for re-entry. He had done the stupidity of going to such great lengths to become the first man to set foot on the new world; now, it was a race against time to reach it, whether he liked it or not…and maybe become the first human being to die on it. Fate really liked playing cruel jokes sometimes.

Plotting a rough re-entry corridor, charting his trajectory literally by the seat of his pants because of the fried radio altimeters, he fired up his remaining booster engine again and, in the brief second before fail-safe valves shut it down too, he entered the re-entry corridor. With the SAR and most navigation instruments inoperable, he had nothing left but the pod's g-meter and his instinct to warn him if he was coming in too steep or too shallow; if he fouled it up, he wouldn't have much time to make a realignment correction…assuming of course, he could pull himself out of that descent without thrust. And then there was the question of the unfamiliar terrain waiting under those clouds; how suitable could it be for a safe landing?

He felt the zero gravity of space disappear as he plunged into the upper layers of the planet's atmosphere, his crippled pod shaking violently against the friction of the air brushing against its already-scorched skin. In comparison to the storm, which had been electromagnetic bursts hitting the hull like bullets, this was a real inferno, the heat soaring up to 2,000 degrees in seconds, turning the heat shield red-hot, searching for the faintest crack to penetrate the weakened hull and cause it to burn up.

_We're coming in too steep. Going to burn up like a fish-and-chips takeaway…_ thought Josh grimly, feeling himself start to sweat, as he watched his g-meter soar to a dangerous 10Gs and climbing, his windshield obscured with clouds of superheated gas brushing past, as his pod plunged deeper into the atmosphere, travelling at a suicidal 300 knots, heading for the ground. But the heat shield held.

Firing up his reverse thrusters to de-accelerate, he managed to bring his pod gliding in at a relatively safe speed of a supersonic jet. Powering down his propellant thrusters, intended only for space flight, he switched to the pod's in-built jet engines, mounted in narrow vents along the hull. The whirring sound told him the jets were fully operational, running off their hydrogen fuel cells. Watching his pitch, he descended through the cloud cover, wandering what he was going to find down there.

The descent seemed endless and with no altimeter or radar to track the ground, Josh was beginning to worry the cloud cover would last all the way down, and maybe send him flying blindly smack-on onto the surface. Then, suddenly, the clouds thinned out and the ground materialised some 5,000ft below him. In spite of his problems, Josh couldn't help but laugh triumphantly at the beautiful sight of the alien terrain below.

His first impression was one of utter bareness and desolation, not unlike his first flight to the Moon; a desert terrain, filled with scattered, reddish-black oxide-like rock formations – the red colour indicating the presence of oxygen, which caused iron minerals to rust -, stretched in every direction, displaying no signs of life. On the western horizon, the outline of the nebulous Nimh-Alpha was rising for the approaching night, looking much larger than the Moon or the Sun ever did from Earth. Likewise, on the eastern horizon, the twin suns Centauri-A and B were setting, the day cycles working in reverse on this planet, as it was a satellite of another larger body circling their star, like the Moon was to the Earth.

The atmosphere was not bright blue as the Earth's, but rather a pale, pinkish-cyan colour, possibly from the rich concentration of noble gasses in the air, combined with the reflection of the oxide-coloured terrain, indicating a potential lack of oceans here. Josh wanted to take an atmospheric reading, to check oxygen concentration and pressure levels, but with the pod's external sensors all fried, it was impossible.

Then suddenly, he realised the ground was actually icy; what he had mistaken for the colour of the terrain was in fact thick concentrations of permafrost, turning the barren soil crystalline white. Permafrost…Water! The most crucial resource to sustain life, aside from oxygen, was present on this new planet. And while it probably wasn't the same concentration or composition like on Earth, it would certainly put them miles ahead with their terraforming operations.

Scanning the landscape for a suitable landing site, he suddenly caught sight of something that nearly took his breath away: at first glance, it looked like an optical illusion; but then, as he looked again, in the distance, at the foot of some mountains, he saw something that even the most eccentric scientists on Earth wouldn't dare dream of finding.

"Are those…_trees_? Oh my God, they are…" Josh muttered, staring dumbstruck as the desert suddenly ended and a landscape of green valleys and forests replaced it. There was no way of telling what kind of vegetation it was, other than it was green and thriving, but it was real nonetheless. In the distance, Josh could also see the shore of a large lake – perhaps an inland sea – with this green paradise growing all around it. Streams trailed away from it, transporting water to other parts of this oasis. Josh and his crew had come all this way, hoping to transform a barren planet into a new earth; only this place didn't need terraforming to begin with.

A quick glance at all this green lush and lakes alone confirmed that Nimh-Beta was nothing less than a flourishing planet, complete with its own ecosystem. All those fancy bio-payloads they had carted up here were worthless, nature having done all the work for them. While it was possible there might be certain contaminants unsuitable for humans, whether chemical or biological, as well as the presence of humans on this planet might unleash their own body contaminants into this pristine environment, the prospects of establishing a new home for the human race couldn't get any better.

Suddenly, his amazing first self-guided tour of the new world was cut short by a new crisis: in his distraction with his incredible discovery, he had completely forgotten he was flying a crippled spacecraft, which had to be set down as quickly as possible; only now, there was no place to land, not with all that thick jungle stretching out beneath him. To make matters worse, he discovered the hydraulic system had been damaged, making it impossible to lower the undercarriage for touchdown. And meanwhile, the pod was on borrowed flying time.

With his ion boosters inoperable, he only had the jets left to keep him in the air, and they were only designed for attitude correction in atmospheric flight, not long-distance travelling; meanwhile, beneath him, the jungle showed no sign of ending and it was too late to turn round and try for the desert he had left behind, as such a large course correction would cause a stall. With his current rate of descent, he estimated he had maybe another five minutes of glide time left, after which he'd end up an atomic mushroom cloud sprouting from the ground, when he'd smash straight into it like a meteorite. He needed a revised landing flight path and fast.

For standard procedures, the Scout had the landing capabilities of a V/STOL aircraft, as per the nature of the mission; without the need for a runway, the pod could be set down vertically on any spot of flat ground its size. For emergency contingencies, she was also designed for a runway landing, using a deployable drogue chute for aero braking, in a similar fashion to the old Space Shuttle. In an extreme case scenario, the pilot could even lighten the payload by hitting the panic switch; a system used to jettison the ion booster assembly and splitting the pod in half, using the cockpit section as a 'lifeboat', and giving the jets a longer durability. However, Josh was hoping it would only come to this as a last resort, for it would ruin all his chances of taking off again if he could make repairs on the ground.

With his glide time quickly running out, his system status panel displaying warning lights that the jets were starting to overheat and would soon go into emergency shutdown like the booster engines, Josh saw the alternative: the lake up ahead had a circumference of several square miles; more than enough flat 'ground' for an emergency landing, in which the undercarriage wouldn't be needed. Although a water-landing scenario had only been simulated by the designers - never tested -, Josh knew it was his best bet, save for bailing out and losing his pod altogether, leaving him stranded. Perhaps, if he manoeuvred correctly, he could ditch the pod in the shallows, lower the undercarriage manually, and taxi out onto dry land for repairs.

Just as he aligned himself with the lake, some 10,000ft ahead of his position, preparing for a water landing, the klaxon sounded again as the first of the four jets went; warning icons appeared on his screen, announcing a half-hour cooling period before he could power up again. Not a moment too soon, the second one went as well; now running on only half-thrust, the pod was quickly losing altitude, the airspeed dropping below cruising minimum, threatening to stall.

_Come on sweetheart…almost there…_ _Don't you disappoint your Uncle Josh now…_ Josh urged on his pod, struggling to keep it level, preparing for splashdown. With one hand on the stick and the other on the chute deploy switch, he prepared for the stunt that just might get him out of this in one piece.

Jet number three went…

With his last jet about to go at any second, Josh brought the pod's nose up, braced himself for a violent aero braking; just as he flew over the edge of the lake, his last jet finally went, leaving him gliding in without power. If he messed this up now, he was history. Just as he felt the belly of the pod hit the water, he deployed the chute; the violent jolt sent him huddling forward with such force, for an instant he thought his neck would snap. The pod was thrown forward on its belly, the drogue of the chute protruding from the back straightening it out just in time for a smooth, horizontal splashdown, rather than a catastrophic angled impact.

Like a speedboat, the pod skidded forward across the water, the massive chute trailing in the air behind it like a kite, its cords stretched tight as piano wires, as it struggled against the craft's massive velocity, making it seem as if it was about to disintegrate at any second. But NIMH's engineers had done a good job as the pod miraculously held together, speeding towards the opposite shore. Before Josh could even reassure himself that his little stunt had paid off, the pod lost the last of its velocity and stopped dead, bogging up in the water a few yards off shore.

His head still spinning from the g-forces, Josh lay back to recover from the crash-landing, grateful to be alive – a rather unusual thing for a seasoned aviator who had lost count of the bailouts and emergency landings he had pulled off as a fighter pilot. Throughout his career he had experienced the worst near-death situations associated with flying imaginable – enemy fire, smash-ups, in-flight fires and explosions, instrument and engine failures, ditching in the middle of a freezing ocean, being stranded in the wilderness without supplies -, but this somehow felt different; it was like destiny had put his skills to the test by having him defy the odds and brave this storm, pulling off a seemingly impossible landing on the surface of a new planet, to claim it for mankind. Whether he lived to tell about it or not, the honour would still be his forever.

Before he could reflect on the fact that the worst might not be over yet and of the problems that still lay ahead of him, trouble struck. Looking around him, he realised the nose of the pod was tilting skywards; the loud gurgling of water all around him told him he was sinking. The ion boosters mounted in the back, which weighed much more than what their small sizes suggested, because of their hyper-dense unobtainium fuel rods, were functioning like an anchor, pulling the pod under by the tail, while the air pocket in the cockpit kept the nose above water. But not for much longer.

The gurgling in the background told Josh that the water was flooding the jet vents, causing the pod to slowly sink to a watery grave. Any second now, it would slip under, taking him with it to the bottom. Turning to his control panel, he hit a switch to deploy the emergency floatation bags, which were meant to keep the pod afloat after splashdown. The system didn't respond. Around him, the systems were all going into automatic emergency shutdown, as safety sensors sprang into action to save what was left of the fragile avionics from the water. He had to get the hell out of here!

Realising he couldn't save his pod, so he might as well try and save himself before it was too late, Josh quit playing with his dead controls and hit the canopy's emergency release button before the last of the power went. The airtight seal popped and the canopy slid open; in an instant, Josh was swamped by more water that came pouring in. Reaching under his seat, he pulled out a backpack-like container made of the same vacuum-proof fabric as his space suit and bearing the large _NIMH-1_'s owl logo in front, which was the pod's survival kit. Tossing it out through the open canopy, he tried to climb out as well, only to find his safety harness had jammed, keeping him strapped into the seat of his sinking pod.

Struggling to undo his jammed seatbelt, like a man about to be buried alive at sea, he saw the surface of the lake disappear above his head as the dead pod – soon to become the waterlogged casket of an astronaut – sunk to the bottom like a stone. Through his sealed visor, still supplying him with air from his suit pack, Josh saw his world turn a hazy blue from the water. Feeling his pod settle on the lakebed with a resounding thud, he struggled to free himself from his harness. But it had stuck fast, the harness refusing to give way. Although he could hold out down here for quite a while on his suit oxygen, the pod wasn't traceable underwater and the auxiliary distress transmitter was in the survival kit floating on the surface above him.

Looking frantically around for anything sharp he could use to cut himself free, he spotted his pocketknife, which he had brought with him out of habit before leaving the mother ship. His trusty little talisman lay on the floor between his legs, its stainless steel blade gleaming against the pod's greenish emergency lights, still running on the auxiliary power. Not missing his chance, he picked it up and got to work undoing the screws on the buckle that kept his waist harness secured; there was no point trying to cut through the harness itself as it was made of some of the toughest fibres used in engineering. Through his headset, he could hear his suit alarm buzzing, warning him he was hyperventilating, his heartbeat racing, as he frantically worked to cut himself free of this death trap.

Twenty frantic minutes later, the harness finally came loose; without warning, Josh found himself being lifted clean off his seat, his air-filled pressure suit carrying him towards the surface like a bubble. Breaking the surface of the lake, he reached for the floating survival kit – his only remaining means of survival – and swam for shore. Soon, he was marching up the sand of the lakeshore, his pressure suit all soaked and drenched in algae; the first ever 'castaway' from outer space had set foot on Nimh-Beta.

Collapsing on the ground in exhaustion, his pocket-knife still clutched in his hand, he turned to look at the spot where his pod had vanished, out on the lake; bubbles and steam were still coming from the bottom, where the wrecked pod lay in its watery grave. Nearby, the drogue chute, still attached to the submerged fuselage by its cords, bobbed up in the water, marking the crash site. In spite of the odds being completely against him the moment he had been swallowed up by the storm, he had come through unharmed. However, Josh was hardly in the mood for celebration as the seriousness of his situation quickly sank in.

Back on Earth, Josh had experienced his fair share of harsh survival conditions following his numerous aircraft crashes; however, back then, even in the worst of conditions, there were always a few simple things one could take for granted, things that may not apply on this alien planet.

The first main concern was breathable air; although there was no doubt that this place had a potentially atmosphere with pressure and oxygen – the presence of liquid water and plant life confirming that -, Josh knew it would be foolish to try and breathe it right away. During astronaut training, he had covered many scenarios of living in an alien atmosphere; although the chemical composition may be similar, it could still be contaminated with lethal trace gasses or microbes, against which the human body might have no immunity. Either way, death by an alien disease or gas poisoning was still death all the same and nothing less.

In spite of his hesitation, Josh knew he had no choice. The Scout was trashed; his original plan of attempting to make repairs and taking flight again, to return to the _NIMH-1_ in orbit, had been rendered moot the instant that pod had sunk into the lake. As it stood, he would have to hold out down here on his own, until the storm engulfing the planet cleared and his colleagues could send a rescue party. According to Dr Shelton, the storm could last several days, even weeks; without the pod's life support, his suit oxygen could sustain him for maybe 12 hours. Then what?

Setting down his survival kit on a rock to dry, Josh proceeded to check his suit instruments; everything seemed undamaged by the water, all the fragile components wrapped in watertight insulation for pool training. Likewise, the storm and the crash had caused no significant damage, the pod having taken most of the beating instead. Glancing at the computer touch-screen on his wrist, he could see it was displaying his vitals, oxygen supply, and mission time correctly, all systems in the green.

Taking out his HHC from its housing and doing a quick scan for glitches, he opened up the recovery memory bank – a black box of sorts -, where the flight data from his pod's computer was automatically stored in flight. Although the HHC was undamaged, the data was badly scrambled and full of gaps because of the storm blackout, making it difficult to pinpoint his landing location. All he could deduce from the scraps of data measuring his re-entry corridor compared with his designated landing point, was that he had swayed way off-course in his descent by going into an ellipse, landing some 2,000 miles north of his original course, at a longitude equivalent to that of southern England back on Earth.

It didn't take him long to realise he was in quite a fix; with the pod lost and stranded thousands of miles away from where his colleagues were expected to search for him once the storm cleared, would delay the arrival of the rescue even more, during which time he would have to fend for himself. Turning back to his HHC, he turned to Environment Analysis. The atmospheric readings came out positive, without any traces of known toxic gases or microbes:

ENVIRONMENT ANALYSIS:

COMPOSITION: 71% Nitrogen, 22% Oxygen, 3% Carbon Dioxide, 1% Helium, 2% Methane, 1% Water Vapour

PRESSURE: 90,7 kPa / 11psi

TEMPERATURE: 15,8 degrees Celsius

SOLAR RADIATION: 4% Ultraviolet, 45% Visible, 51% Infrared

GRAVITY: 0,91G

NO KNOWN HARMFUL BIOLOGICAL AGENTS DETECTED

COMPARISON WITH TERRESTRIAL ENVIRONMENT: 87% POSITIVE

HUMAN DECISION REQUIRED

Although significantly different from the Earth, with a slightly lower gravity and a higher concentration of greenhouse gases (probably what kept this planet warm during the day), the environment appeared survivable. All that was left now was to take the big step and put those positive readings to the test.

Josh hesitated; maybe it wouldn't kill him instantly, but maybe there was some unknown contaminant his biosensors couldn't detect, maybe in the form of germs or toxic spores, which could cause some fatal illness after long-term exposure. Then again, he couldn't rely on his suit reserves for much longer. It just had to be done and he could only hope for the best.

Taking a final deep breath, he undid the safety catch of his visor plate; his suit alarm was instantly buzzing like mad, warning of imminent decompression. Shutting it off, Josh popped the seal of the visor plate and tilted it open, shutting his eyes as he did. He felt his ears pop by the pressure difference outside and for an instant he felt fear; perhaps his sensor readings were wrong and this wasn't such a good idea? Would he have enough time to repressurise and recycle the air before brain damage occurred from asphyxia? Slowly and cautiously, he took his first breath of the Nimh-Beta's air.

_God, don't You let me down now…_

His lungs, unaccustomed to this unusual gas composition seemed to reject it and for a few seconds, Josh found himself coughing and spluttering, as if he were breathing something foul, his eyes stinging from the higher oxygen concentration in the air. But after a few tries, he lungs adjusted to the new air and he was able to taste it in earnest. The Nimh-Betan air felt like a breath of life; despite the lower pressure and greenhouse gasses, the higher oxygen concentration made up for it, turning the air completely breathable, possibly even better than the Earth's. Although the risk of biological contaminants could only be determined in the long run, the prospect of dying of asphyxia here had just been rendered nil.

Josh burst out laughing, "This day just keeps getting better and better…" he chuckled, removing his visor, gloves and suit pack. He turned to look skywards, where the _NIMH-1_ was probably still orbiting, his colleagues wondering what had happened to him, "Think I am dead, don't you, Old Iron-Fist? Well, think again Commander Fitzgibbons, before you decide to put me down as lost in action; your unmanned pod was lost up there but I am still here! Man triumphs where technology fails…"

Removing his suit and hanging it from a tree trunk to dry off, he proceeded to take inventory of what he had. Emptying his pockets, he found his pocketknife, his cap, his dog tag, his space watch, and his pen; small commodities, which he would have to make due with in any way he knew how, to increase his chances of survival. And for that he would need something more. But first, always being the traditional Brit, he couldn't forget the explorer's old protocol. He cleared his throat, preparing for a speech he and Colonel McEwen had rehearsed regularly before departure.

"I hereby claim this planet in the name of his Sovereign Majesty King George VII of England and the Commonwealth Realms, and for the benefit of all mankind!" He smirked at his lack of audience as well the absence of a camera he and his colleagues were meant to use to record this event, so it could be broadcast back on Earth upon their return.

_Some of the greatest moments in history sometimes occur under the most unlikely circumstances_, thought Josh, his speech over as quickly as it had started, as he turned to the bulgy survival kit he had salvaged from the pod. Now it was time to focus on his new mission: survival.

Setting it down on a rock and unzipping it, he spread out the folded-up sections of the kit, their pockets containing the carefully arranged contents of the stranded pilot's survival arsenal. Like every other piece of equipment onboard the _NIMH-1_, the survival kits had been spared no expenses by NIMH's COs, allowing for each of their astronauts to brave a survival situation in luxury. And the best part was that Josh, aside from being a top-notch professional in the most advanced skills imaginable, was also the designer of these kits, adding his own personal touch to the mission, aside from the perfections he had made to the pods' design as an aeronautical engineer.

For health and nutrition, the arsenal was equipped with a good first-aid kit, including sterile dressings, bandages, gauze tape, band-aids, antiseptic, aspirin, some morphine (painkiller), dexamethasone (anti-inflammatory), epinephrine (adrenalin), and penicillin (antibiotic), for treating the common symptoms associated with extraterrestrial diseases, as well as surgical scalpel, scissors and tweezers, some salt and sugar, and even a hygiene kit. With regards to food, there were a number of flavoured high-energy bars, similar to the standard MREs used onboard ship, only smaller, enough to supply the nutritious requirements for one person for 72 hours. As for water, there was none, the canteen being rigged to his space suit; however there was a whole box of water purification tablets as well as a filter for removing grit.

For shelter and warmth, there was a full-sized space blanket, a full-body lightweight poncho, a pocket towel, a hydrogen-cell spark lighter - not unlike the old Zippos -, and a box of solid-fuel capsules for fire. With regards to tools, there was a LED flashlight with a 1-million-candle brightness, an electric multitool with 16 removable blades and heads for different applications, a multipurpose hatchet, a potash rebreather, and, joy of all joys, a tin containing flints, pins, a length of parachute cord, saw-wire, insulation tape, needles, and a weather notebook. Finally, there was a pair of binocular goggles with night, thermal, and infrared vision.

As far as signalling and navigation was concerned, the kit contained a flare pistol with ten cartridges, some glow-sticks, signal-mirror, and even and old-fashioned magnetic compass. The primary instrument however came in the form of a peculiar spider-like device on a pegged tripod, with folded solar rechargers, which resembled a miniature communications satellite. This was the emergency ELFPCRT (Extremely Low Frequency Portable Communications Relay Tower); a device that could 'reroute' data from the astronaut's one-way suit radio and navigation beacon, normally transmitted via the pod's relay unit to the mother ship, in the event that all the pod's systems failed.

The final touch to the kit was a small weapons arsenal – the first hand arsenal ever employed for a space mission. The primary weapon consisted of a prototype electromagnetic-pulse space handgun, which could fire up to a thousand microscopic aluminium rounds, by employing the same physics from the _NIMH-1_'s ion drives, without the use of gunpowder or disposable cartridges. Each of these rounds would cause a super-hot electrical discharge on contact, inflicting deep cauterising wounds, in a similar fashion to a laser weapon. Finally, there was a high-voltage extendable taser, and two stun grenades, as backup weapons.

These gadgets, plus his space suit and the clothes he was wearing, was all Josh had to survive on this new planet for an unspecified length of time, until his colleagues came to his rescue. Satisfied, Josh carefully put everything away and sat down to reassess. Since he was way off course, he would have to set up the ELFPCRT as soon as possible and put out a distress signal on the air for the rescue to pinpoint his location when it arrived. But that would have to wait until tomorrow.

Remembering from Dr Shelton's assessments, although Nimh-Beta remained habitable during the day because of the greenhouse gasses, in winter, because of the elliptic orbit of the Nimh bodies, the nights could turn freezing cold, like in the deserts back on Earth. With his pod lost, he would have to find some shelter for the approaching night and soon.

His watch couldn't be set to the precise Nimh-Beta time until he could set up that communications tower tomorrow, yet, by the position of the two suns in the sky, he figured he had maybe another four hours of daylight left. He turned to look at the forest on the edge of the lakeshore and his jaw dropped in amazement. In the past hour, he had had more incredible surprises than a sane man would expect to find in a lifetime; in his case, however, it seemed his share of surprises were only just beginning, as he took out his HHC to do a species matching on the surrounding flora.

"What the bloody hell…? No, this can't be right…" he muttered, scanning the mosses growing on some nearby rocks. According to the scanner, this was _Arbuchanaria_, a common type of terrestrial peat moss…yes, _terrestrial_. Alongside it, the scanner also identified more familiar species; many unrelated to each other and uncommonly found growing together in the same climate zones back on Earth, yet terrestrial all the same. And Josh knew genetics couldn't lie; as he turned to look at them with the naked eye, he could clearly recognise many familiar species, mostly native to temperate climates, with a touch of tropical here and there. It was almost as if this place was some natural hodgepodge, where terrestrial flora had taken root and adapted over long periods of time, morphing into one mass climate zone that probably covered most of the planet, excluding the poles.

Josh was utterly dumbstruck; he was no scientist, but this discovery was enough to drive even the most incompetent of botanists to madness. A terrestrial ecosystem flourishing on a supposedly lifeless planet, light years away from Earth? Where had it all originated from? This place had never had any contact with Earth before, yet there was, what appeared to be, an ecosystem originating from terrestrial species that had adapted to the environment of Nimh-Beta. How, by the Almighty, was that possible?

As he stood there, pondering on this new mystery, Josh was suddenly startled by a rustling coming from the woods; something was lurking in the trees, approaching in his direction. Abandoning his botanical surveys, Josh was on his feet in an instant, hastily reaching for the handgun in his kit. So far, it hadn't occurred to him that where there was thriving plant life, there had to be animals too. As he strained his ears, trying to listen, he picked up a new sound; one he wasn't expecting to hear in this place, not in a million years: _voices!_ Yes, it was, without a shadow of a doubt, _human voices_, in clear English!

Josh was petrified, wandering if he was going mad. Perhaps the g-forces from the storm had given him a worse concussion than he thought? While he was no coward, the very idea of hearing human voices and in his own language nonetheless, on an unknown planet, light-years away from his home, was utterly terrifying.

With his legs literally working on their own accord, his mind screaming at him to take cover, Josh approached the trees for a closer look. Sure enough, he could hear the rustling, as well as whoever – or _whatever_ – was causing it, getting closer and closer, approaching fast. He could clearly make out two voices, talking urgently to each other.

"Hurry up Sullivan, you useless fat lout! It's out there on the lake! We'll miss it!" barked a furious voice to someone, who seemed to be struggling to keep up with his companion. In the background, Josh could hear some heavy paws hitting the ground in a run, combined with the sound of wooden wheels, making him realise they were riding some animal-drawn vehicle.

Another, less rough voice, retorted, "I am doing my best, Jenner! For the Great Owl's sakes, this is not a rundown drill! And I don't think we should be going there, not without alerting Justin first…" A loud slap was heard, which sounded like the first speaker had struck his companion over the head.

"Not before I've made sure I saw what I think I saw, now come on…!" growled back the first voice menacingly, now getting very close. Before Josh could snap out of his trance and take cover, the bushes were parted by a large furry hand with long claws, and brandishing a sword, as the source of the voice finally came into view. Josh's heart skipped a beat as he laid sight on the most incredible, and utterly horrifying, sight imaginable.

Standing before him were two human-sized giant rats, dressed in tunics and armour plates, gleaming swords in hand, each riding a chariot drawn by a buffalo-sized giant rabbit in harnesses. It was like a nightmare come alive; these creatures, mostly anthropomorphic in appearance and nature, yet still not indistinguishable from their terrestrial counterparts, stood, real flesh and blood, before Josh's eyes. At the sight of the human, both rats halted their rabbit-drawn chariots, freezing in their tracks in equal surprise, their jaws agape with amazement. But not for long.

The large, evil-faced rat, apparently the leader of the pair, came to his senses first; before Josh could formulate any kind of response, the creature, its red eyes suddenly glaring with a savage fury at the sight of him – or more precisely, the _NIMH-1_'s owl logo knitted on the left chest pocket of his uniform -, was upon him. Josh barely managed to dodge the swinging blade as he rolled aside, to avoid being run over by the charging chariot, tearing open his kit, hanging over his shoulder, going for his weapons. The rat jumped from his chariot, frantically going for Josh as he raised his sword with both hands, about to skewer the human lying at his feet.

Drawing the taser, Josh barely managed to extend the forked tip and hit the zap button, before his attacker could plunge his sword into his body; the taser found him square in the chest, the armoured vest nicely conducting the electricity throughout his body. With a scream, the rat went down in a shower of sparks, stunned by the shock. His companion, a timid-looking, chubby fellow, turned his chariot round and fled, terrified by the weapon, before Josh could stun him too.

Being a trained soldier, the stranded astronaut realised that it was only a matter of time before the rat returned with reinforcements. Although his weapons were undoubtedly far more advanced in comparison to their medieval-style swords and armour, it would still be impossible to resist an entire army of these giant rats single-handedly! Despite his survival training of sticking close to the crash site until help arrived, he had to relocate immediately, or else they'd be finding him as dead as his pod on the bottom of the lake.

Hurrying back to his camp, he zipped back into his space suit and gathered up his arsenal, making sure to cover all traces of his presence here, intent on making it as difficult as possible for any hunting party to pick up his trail. While it was entirely possible these rats could still trace him by scent like their terrestrial cousins, military training of escape and evasion was Josh's only reliable strategy at this point. Just as the savage rat regained consciousness, Josh took off into the woods, heading anywhere but here.

"What kind of hellhole planet is this?" the astronaut thought, running as fast as his legs would carry him, still struggling to come to terms with the incomprehensible reality of his situation, wondering if he'd ever make it out of this nightmare in one piece. His joy of being the first man to set foot on Nimh-Beta now seemed not so rosy after all…

Meanwhile, Jenner and his aid-de-camp Sullivan, had reunited and were staring in the direction of the woods, where the human intruder had fled. The two rats were on the High Council (the government) of Rosebush City, their subterranean home and the capitol of their homeland. Jenner, a highly ambitious and often ruthless rat, a veteran warrior, with an endless lust for power, was the estranged nephew of the Leader Rat, Nicodemus.

While the people of Rosebush City were a prosperous and peaceful society, deep down, the Rats of Nimh-Beta lived in the shadow of a constant fear, one handed down from their ancestors and which persisted to this day. According to their biblical history, their distant ancestors had been slaves to the ruthless humans of the faraway, legendary Land of Nimh. Following a legendary escape by means of 'spiritual guidance' given to them by their divine mentor, the Great Owl of the Genesis Temple of Nimh, the Rats of Nimh had built a world for themselves and prospected, yet always remained fearful that the Humans of the Land of Nimh might someday return, to destroy them all.

Unlike some of the most academic rats, who considered humans and the Land of Nimh to be pure fantasy and superstition, Jenner was a firm believer and was always on his guard. He and his often unwilling sidekick Sullivan would often go behind Nicodemus's back, plotting trouble to suit their own dark ambitions, sometimes even going to extreme lengths to get his way, especially on matters regarding their need for constant vigilance against the never-ending threat of Nimh.

As it turned out, the two of them had been out riding alone, when they'd caught sight of Josh's pod and had hurried over to investigate. Jenner's suspicions had been proven correct the instant they had laid eyes on the alien human, bearing the giveaway mark of 'NIMH' on his clothing.

"By the Great Owl, did you see that Jenner? That was a damn human, branded with the mark of Nimh itself! We've got to tell Nicodemus and Justin at once…!" But his master held him back, whispering dangerously in his face.

"You are not to speak a word of what happened here to anyone, least of all Nicodemus. The last thing I need is my foolish Uncle to start handling things his own soft way. We are the ones who stayed true to our ancestors' pledge for ultimate triumph over Nimh, so it's our destiny to face this threat our way! That human has to be found and brought back to _me_ alive, to be questioned for the secrets of his powers…"

"But how to you expect us to do this? That…that _creature_ has escaped and is on the run! They can't possibly scorn your claims this time…"

"That is because you have never learned to bid your time, so that you may take what you can, _when_ you can, instead of running off like a coward to alert an old fool, who can't even be called a leader. That human can't evade us forever; he will be at our mercy soon enough, just when he thinks he has gained the upper hand…"

**Author's note:** My sincere apologies for the long delay but I was fighting writer's block, among other problems. The next chapter hopefully will not be that long coming and will have Josh meeting Mrs Brisby for the first time. Enjoy and PLEASE REVIEW!


	5. Chapter 5 Help From The Children

**Location: Nimh-Beta Forest Uplands, south of Rosebush City. **

New Mission Time: Day 2

It was way past nightfall before Josh finally decided to stop and make camp for the night. He had been on the go for nearly 12 hours now, with only minimum rest periods, eager to put as much space as possible between himself and those savage humanoid rats. After hiking restlessly all day, making sure he wasn't being followed, like a soldier stranded on hostile territory – which, in essence, was precisely his situation -, he had covered a good twenty miles and was exhausted. Despite the seemingly endless adrenaline rush pumping through his body, he knew he couldn't go on much farther; even all the adrenaline in the world wouldn't keep his heart from eventually exploding from the effects of fatigue.

His long trek had taken him across the seemingly endless forest, until he had returned to the edge of the desert. From there, he had hiked on until nightfall, seeing nothing but a barren landscape of oxide rock formations and permafrost for hours. Could that stretch of green lush he had left behind him, where the Rats lived, be the only hospitable spot for hundreds of miles? What then?

His troubles had soon started, at sunset, which had quickly turned the desert freezing cold, forcing him to switch on his suit's short-lived thermal batteries to keep going. But with his visor plate open to breathe, he was venting out much of the suit warmth, leaving him with little protection against the cold, making it virtually unbearable. Finally, the batteries had died altogether, leaving him at the mercy of the cold.

With nothing left to provide heat with but his lighter, he had resorted to using his space blanket as a 'balaclava'; by wrapping it around his head and neck to insulate the open neck ring of his space suit, he allowed his body to trap its own heat within the thin thermal insulation, making it survivable, but still far from bearable. Under the luminous, nebulous Nimh-Alpha gas giant, taking up nearly a tenth of the night sky, he had pressed on, hoping to survive the first endless night.

With no choice but to keep moving, to prevent hypothermia from kicking in, he had kept walking for hours, before finally coming to the edge of another stretch of green lush. Although it seemed more likely to find shelter there than out in the open desert, there was still no way of knowing what kind of dangers might be lurking in those trees; however, feeling close to collapse from exhaustion, Josh realised he had no choice.

Using his dimming suit lights, he scouted around the woods for a while, before finally finding a thick willow tree, the size of a small apartment building. Climbing up the massive twisted roots protruding from the foot of the tree, each as thick as a city sewer pipe, he found a small hollow in the trunk part-way up, spacious enough to accommodate him for the night. He would have gladly made a fire but feared the smoke would give him away to any pursuers who might be following him.

Like a squirrel, using some dead leaves for bedding, he curled up inside his makeshift shelter and sunk into the deepest sleep of his life, like a dead man, wondering what kind of death he would eventually meet on this strange, godforsaken planet he was stranded on…

It seemed like an eternity before Josh finally opened his eyes again to the beauty of daylight; the cold of the night had passed and the air was warm again from the planet's greenhouse effect, the forest blazing with light under the rays of Nimh-Beta's twin suns. The faint trickling of thawing permafrost could be heard throughout the forest, some leaking down through a crack in the wood, dripping across Josh's face, still red from exposure.

His muscles and joints all stiff and sore from the cold last night, as well as from his long trek the other day, Josh stretched and yawned, only then realising just how hungry he was. He hadn't had anything to eat since his last meal onboard the _NIMH-1_, save for a single energy bar he had consumed during his trek, intent on extending his few emergency rations for as long as possible.

Despite having survived the first night, Josh now knew he would have to make special arrangements if he was to survive for much longer in this alien wilderness. After having observed the planet's daily cycle, he now knew the time gaps between dawn and dusk, as well as the hazards that came with each period of the day.

For starters, he would have to find some better shelter from the cold of night; remembering what Dr Stetson had said, he had the misfortune of having arrived here in, what was probably, mid-autumn, according to the Nimh-Beta's calendar. This meant that, with the planet's elliptic orbit around its sun, the cold would only intensify and soon, as Nimh-Beta entered its winter period. It was probably only a matter of a few months, if not weeks, before this place would freeze in earnest, at which point survival out in the open would be even more difficult, if not impossible. Unfortunately, there wasn't much he could do at this point but hope the storm would lift soon, so the rescue could haul arse.

Then, there was the question of food. Even with the strictest of rationing, his kit's emergency rations would only last him a few more days at best, on the basis that he avoided too much physical exertion. As things were, this would be impossible; his first day on Nimh-Beta had made it clear that daily physical exertion – and a colossal one at that – was necessary, and for that he would need a rich, balanced diet to see him through the entire duration of his stay. And the only available food source was the Nimh-Beta's environment; like a castaway, he would have to tap into the flora and fauna of this alien world, to secure his nutritious needs before his kit's supplies run out. That would be his task for today, if he wanted to eat.

Removing his spacesuit, which he wouldn't need again until nightfall, but keeping his space boots on, which would be better for scouting around through this wilderness than his flight sneakers, he picked up his kit, weapons handy, preparing for the day. Leaving behind a landmark in the form of a carved arrow at the foot of the tree to help him find his way back, he set off.

Now that he was rested and thinking straight again, Josh was able to get a better look at the environment of this strange planet. Having grown up on a farm in his native England as a boy, Josh didn't need to be a scientist to recognise his surroundings. The place was filled with gigantic creatures, including birds, snails, worms, rabbits, hedgehogs, and insects, not counting the flora, all of which far exceeded the average size of their terrestrial counterparts, yet definitely the same species. It was almost as if he was back on Earth, but shrunken down to mouse size, making him feel like the character Nils Holgersson.

The flora, although unnaturally gigantic, was not particularly tall for its enlarged size, possibly as a result of the near-terrestrial gravity of this world versus its excessive weight and mass; likewise, the animals seemed to have differently developed bodies, having adjusted to their unsuitably enlarged sizes over centuries of evolution. It was almost as if the enlargement of the animals and flora was some sort of freak mutation, yet with no explanation as to how. Nonetheless, it had its advantages, the greatest of all being the abundance of food.

It wasn't long before Josh discovered some berry bushes – blueberries and blackberries mostly -, their tennis-ball-sized fruit handing from their thorny branches, looking ripe and most delectable. Trying one hesitantly, he found it to be wholesome and filling. Soon, he had satisfied his hunger, reviving his starving body with renewed energy. Improvising a carrier bag out of his space blanket, Josh gathered as many berries as he could carry and set off to return to his shelter.

Suddenly, a rustling in the bushes nearby told him he was being watched; his heart skipped a beat as he turned around, only to find himself staring face-to-face with a giant, mouse-like creature, staring at him through the foliage with wide eyes. In contrast to the savage rats he had encountered the other day however, this one was an innocent-looking youngster, with tan-coloured fur and wearing a ribbon-like tunic. The creature was only visible for a split second; at the sight of the astronaut staring back at her, she turned and bolted, terrified out of her wits.

"Oh, damn…!" Josh cursed, furious at having let his guard down and allowed himself to be seen, "Hey, you there, wait…!" In an instant, he had given chase; although he dreaded to think what he might be forced to do when he caught up with this little bugger, he knew he couldn't just sit back and do nothing, otherwise those rats would soon be back on his trail.

Hurrying over to where he had seen the mouse, he found something the child had dropped in her haste when running from him. He picked up a mouse rag-doll, hand-knitted, not unlike the teddy bear he used to own as a child, back on Earth. Shoving it in his pants pocket, he tore through the thick foliage, following the mouse's trail.

It wasn't long before the forest thinned out, as he came to the edge of a plantation. The final touch to finding the impossible on an alien planet beyond the outer reach – _civilisation_ – unfolded before Josh's eyes, as he laid eyes on the outskirts of, what appeared to be, some sort of small farming community. He was standing on the edge of a ploughed field, with crops, including corn and kale, towering forty feet high, like the rest of the gigantic flora of this planet. Beyond the plantation, he could see smoke rising from several places around the valley, indicating the presence of a few scattered habitations, possibly farmhouses.

Josh's first thought was to turn on his heels and get the hell out of there, before he was spotted; but his curiosity got the better of him and he crept closer, staring in silent fascination, brandishing his revolver in case he ran into someone unpleasant. Sure enough, he could hear voices coming from nearby; chancing a peak around a massive corn plant, he saw two giant, humanoid mice at work, loading ears of corn onto a cart.

The first one was a sweet-looking lady mouse with stunning blue eyes and a rather timid expression, wearing a ragged, woollen red cape. The younger mouse with the patchy sleeveless dress helping her, judging by her similar chocolate-brown fur and blue eyes, had to be her daughter. The two of them appeared to be farmers and while they retained many of their normal mouse traits and characteristics, they stood upright, wore clothes, and seemed to have developed simple skills like planting crops or building carts, making them very human-like in nature.

"…Here Teresa dear, this is the last one. Come on, let's go get cleaned up and then we can break for lunch," said the red-capped mouse, wiping her forehead in exhaustion, "Have you seen Timmy anywhere?"

"He said he wasn't feeling too well, Mother," replied the younger mouse called Teresa, "I think he might have caught another cold from swimming in the river. I told him to go and lie down…"

"Not feeling well?" asked her mother with concern, "Teresa, can you please finish up with Auntie Shrew, while I go and check up on your brother?" Leaving her daughter to finish tying the ears of corn in bundles for their winter storage, the mother mouse hurried away, towards a rocky mud hill on the edge of the plantation, with a smoking chimney protruding from the top, indicating some sort of den or subterranean habitat below.

Meanwhile, Josh had been watching the whole thing with interest, considering his options. In direct contrast to the soldier rats that had tried to ambush him back at the crash site, these mice seemed more or less harmless, maybe even hospitable. Although he knew it was a very risky idea, if not crazy, it could be his only chance of finding some place of refuge out here. He knew he couldn't hold out in the woods for much longer, especially with the approaching winter, but maybe these mice could help him. Then again, how would they react to his presence? What if they were hostile or, worse, handed him over to the rats? The odds seemed to hang in a balance…

Just as he was considering taking his chances and making his presence known, he was suddenly caught off-guard by a rustling behind him; he turned round just in time to see a mean-looking, fat old female rat with a face like a badger, swinging a hoe at his head. Before he could dodge the blow, the hoe struck him hard in the temple. Josh felt himself thrown to the ground and then everything faded to black…

Teresa had just finished loading the last of the corn onto the cart, stiff from all that hard work, eager for her chores to end. Teresa Brisby was 12 years old, a farm mouse all her life, who lived in this isolated province of the Lee of the Stone, not too far away from Rosebush City. Left fatherless since the disappearance of her father Jonathan a few years ago, she lived with her mother Elizabeth and her siblings Martin, Timothy and Cynthia on their farm. Their only neighbours were her mother's aunt, Auntie Shrew, a mean-tempered old mouse with no sense of humour or fun, and with absolutely no patience for children, constantly getting on her brother Martin's nerves and vice-versa; then, there was also Mr Horatio Ages, an elderly, pompous healer mouse and amateur inventor of their small community, brilliant, but with just as little patience for children as Auntie Shrew.

Being the eldest, Teresa had taken the responsibility of looking after her younger siblings alongside her mother since her father had gone, working hard to maintain their small farm, from which their meagre living came from. Her mother also worked as a seamstress and cook for their neighbours, in exchange for some tools or medicine they needed occasionally, but otherwise the family was reasonably well off. Her father had been a keen adventurer, who often joined his rat friends of Rosebush City on expeditions outside their homeland's known territory. A well educated mouse – a rare advantage for someone living in an isolated community as the Lee of the Stone, Jonathan had also been a teacher to his eldest children (Timmy and Cynthia had been toddlers when he died), teaching them how to read and write, as well as telling them stories of his adventures, some of which Teresa now passed on to her siblings.

Following his disappearance and presumed death on one of his solo escapades to a place called Thorn Valley out in the desert, in search of the legendary Temple of the Great Owl, Mrs Brisby had assumed leadership of the family with the occasional help of Auntie Shrew and Mr Ages, working hard to support them, particularly through the long, bitter winters of their home planet, when food and firewood were often scarce and life was harsh.

Although Mr Ages always said that Rosebush City had perfect shelter and plenty of food – a place where he'd move to every winter -, the Brisbies were too proud to beg for charity from Jonathan's old acquaintances. It was during those long cold months, when they'd be cooped up in their little home for weeks, that Teresa and her siblings would sit together around the fire, thinking of their late father and the gap it had left in their mother's heart and their lives, and how they wished it would someday change…

Finished with her work, Teresa was about to go check on her brother Martin, who had been assigned the task of stockpiling firewood by Auntie Shrew, as part of his share of chores - only he often tended to negate his work when everyone's back was turned and wonder off, getting into mischief -, when she heard a commotion by the fence. Hurrying over, she saw her Auntie Shrew bending over a stranger, the hoe she had used to strike him down still clutched in her withered hands. Beside her trailed a tearful and trembling Cynthia, keeping her distance from the strange creature. Something had happened.

"Auntie Shrew, what…what's going on here?" gasped Teresa, alarmed by her great aunt's fury towards this stranger; although Auntie Shrew would often be found in a bad temper on days like this, such a demonstration of violence was very unlike her. And who – or rather _what_ – was this stranger?

"Perfect timing Teresa, dearest," huffed Auntie Shrew incredulously, "It seems Cynthia here was out walking in the woods and got chased by this ruffian. And now this thieving hoodlum tries to sneak in here to steal food," she growled, nudging the unconscious Josh with the tip of her hoe, as if he were a sack of trash, turning him over so they could get a better look at him. Teresa gasped as she laid eyes on the stranger's face. From afar, Josh had the height and size of a rat; but now, the three mice laid eyes upon a…

"Goodness, this guy is a…a _human_!" gasped Teresa in surprise, remembering some of the old stories her father used to tell her and her siblings when he was still alive. Although most mice and rats nowadays regarded humans as imaginary creatures that didn't exist, much less dream of ever meeting one first hand, the legend was still very popular amongst youngsters, including the Brisby children, "Daddy used to say so much about them…"

"Enough about your father's ridiculous telltales Teresa!" snapped Auntie Shrew. Unlike Teresa's mother, the old mouse had little interest in anything outside their realm of their simple lives, not to mention highly distrusting of strangers, "I don't care if this intruder is Nicodemus himself! This hooligan is still a trespasser and a thief and I intend to fix him properly! Go fetch me some rope." Teresa hesitated, curious to find out more about this stranger rather than just turn him away.

But, really Auntie Shrew, shouldn't we…"

"Right now girl!" barked Auntie Shrew furiously, grabbing Josh by the scruff of his neck and slamming him against the nearest corn plant. Taking the rope, she bound Josh's hands securely together behind his back, tying him to the trunk. Now…" She grabbed Teresa's wrist and roughly pulled her over.

"I want you to stay here and keep an eye on this riff-raff, while I go and find some help so we can remove him! Make sure he doesn't get away! And don't you touch that thing Cynthia!" she barked, as the little mouse, fascinated by the strange textures and logos, was pawing through Josh's discarded survival kit, "I don't want you touching this hooligan's dirty loot!"

Leaving the children to keep an eye on the 'thief', Auntie Shrew hurried away towards Mr Ages' house a little ways out in the forest, for some male help. At that moment, another young, chubby mouse, yet handsome like his late father had been, appeared from between the corn plants, his jumper stained with woodchips and looking real sulky.

"That bossy, loudmouth bullfrog," he groaned, looking furious, tapping his knuckles with a stick, "Poking her nose around where she's not wanted, and ordering us to do her dung-work, like she's our mother…"

"Martin!" Teresa scolded her brother, who took no notice as he suddenly laid eyes on Josh, "So who is this bozo then?"

"Martin, language!" Teresa scolded him again, who only pulled a face at her for lecturing him, while Cynthia giggled at her siblings arguing. The sibling rivalry was cut short however as, at that moment, Josh uttered a loud, painful groan, regaining consciousness. The mice drew back, alarmed, unsure of how to treat this human, now wide-awake.

"Ow…bugger…what…where am I? What happened…?" he groaned, his eyes suddenly turning wide at the sight of the three humanoid mice staring back at him, realising his hands were tied. He could recognise the two girl mice, one of which he had just chased here; the boy however looked unfamiliar. There was no sign of the old mouse he had glimpsed before he had been knocked out, probably having gone to get help after tying him up. Still, he managed to retain his composure as he winked at the children, trying to appear friendly, "Oh, eh hallo there…"

"Eh, hallo," replied Martin dumbly, unsure of how to treat this stranger. His sisters seemed pretty nervous themselves as they goggled at the human with peculiar expressions.

"He can talk!" squealed Cynthia, shyly peeping from behind her big sister's dress, where she'd been hiding, afraid of getting too close to this strange creature that had been chasing her only minutes ago.

"He looks like a loony," said Teresa, frowning at the sight of Josh's alien appearance, with his strange clothes and gadgets, all bearing the _NIMH-1_ logo, completely unfamiliar to them. Martin however was quickly becoming intrigued as he fearlessly approached Josh, curiously running his small hands all over him, fascinated by the soft texture and colours of the man's flight uniform.

Although Josh didn't like being touched and prodded at like some pet animal, he couldn't get mad at this youngster and let him go right ahead, carefully thinking of how to get out of this pickle; although somewhat relieved to wake up finding himself held prisoner by a bunch of playful mouse children, rather than more of those cutthroat rats holding spears and swords to his throat, he knew it was only a matter of time before the word spread and someone less pleasant came for him. He had to escape before that old mouse hag who had struck him returned with help!

During his years as a fighter pilot, he had experienced the ordeal of being held prisoner by the enemy in an interrogation room, often pending torture. And like every soldier worth his salt he had been trained both in discipline and skill on how to escape from situations like this, many of which involved catching the enemy by surprise and killing him; only the very idea of being forced to harm these innocent children to save himself was unthinkable. Then again, did he have enough time to do this the easy way?

_Better humour them and maybe you'll get out of this without getting anybody hurt_, he thought, struggling to free his hands but found Auntie Shrew had done a pretty good job with the rope. And his pocketknife was in his trouser leg pocket, just out of reach. He should still be able to loosen the knot eventually but it would take him several minutes, which he probably didn't have.

"What…what are you then?" asked Martin finally, staring at Josh directly in the eyes, "Are you really a human?" Like his sister, the eldest Brisby son was also familiar with the tales of humans and the idea of meeting one really intrigued him. Although still unsure of the wisdom of engaging in any conversation with them – careless talk could easily be passed on to the rats hunting him down -, Josh realised he had no choice and nodded.

"Yes, I come from Earth…from the stars," he explained, assuming these mice weren't familiar with the concept of space travel. Indeed they weren't, as the three siblings stared back at him dumbstruck with amazement.

"From the _stars_? Are you saying you can fly? Like an owl?" gasped Martin in amazement, gesturing at the owl logo of Josh's ship knitted on his uniform front. Whoever – or _whatever_ – this stranger was, he had definitely caught his interest, "Could you show me…?" Teresa however, being older and more mature than her carefree, child-minded brother, still seemed rather doubtful, but nonetheless curious of their visitor.

"So, what are you doing here?" she asked, trying to figure him out. This human didn't seem to mean them any harm, but his story still sounded weird. Could he be lying, to conceal the fact that he had been trying to steal from them, like those other renegade thieves that often passed through here? But then again, he hadn't actually been caught with any stolen corn on him. And how could someone explain his strange appearance and gadgets?

"Good question honey, I was just asking myself the same thing…" said Josh cheekily, freezing in mid-sentence as he suddenly noticed Cynthia had picked up his fallen gun, curiously sniffing down the nuzzle, her tiny hands carelessly caressing the barrel as if it were a toy, about to squeeze the trigger – and the safety catch was off! Time was running out fast, "Eh, do you mind letting me loose fellas? It's getting a little bit uncomfortable…"

"You still haven't answered my question mister," replied Teresa, crossing her arms, her voice suddenly cool and stern, as she pointed her finger at him, "Auntie Shrew said you were chasing Cynthia, weren't you…?" This was the wrong thing to say as Martin rounded on Josh, barring his front teeth in a childish expression of fury.

"You big buzzard, what were you doing to our little sister?!" he snapped, grabbing his stick again, tapping his knuckles in a threatening manner, "You better tell me or I'll…I'll beat the living snot out of you!" But Josh wasn't particularly afraid of experiencing the receiving end of this youngster's wrath, who was too small to cause him any real harm, as he was of little Cynthia continue toying with his loaded gun. He wanted to shout a warning but what would happen if he revealed to the children that he had a dangerous weapon, the likes of which he had never seen before, in his possession? The time had come to speak plain.

"Nothing kid, I wasn't trying to hurt her. We sort of…bumped into each other and I followed her here. Please, I…I need help. I am on the run from the Rats…" At this, the children's expressions softened as they listened to his story.

"My crew are expected to come for me soon; but the Rats mustn't know where I am. If your Auntie talks, they'll come here and kill me. Please, you have to let me go…" Even though Josh always kept a straight, calm face, even in the direst of situations, the sense of urgency in his eyes didn't go amiss by the children. The regarded him for a few more minutes.

"Oh well, guess we better untie him," Martin said finally, kneeling to gnaw through the rope binding Josh's hands. Teresa however was still hesitant.

"Martin, wait a minute. Are you sure about this? Maybe we should talk to Auntie Shrew first…?" But Martin only rebuffed her.

"Since when does Auntie Loudmouth listen to anybody?" he huffed, "Besides, why pass on the opportunity to see her angry when she comes here and finds him gone? I'd love to see her chasing after him on her fat bum…" Even Teresa and Cynthia couldn't suppress their giggles at the thought; they both liked their Auntie very much, but seeing her explode in one of her temper tantrums was something they couldn't possibly resist. And they had developed a great interest in Josh, too much to let conservative Auntie Shrew have her way just like that.

_Thank God for childish innocence and curiosity, long may it reign…_

Pulling his hands free, Josh got to his feet, going as slowly and calmly as possible, weary of frightening the children even more. The instant the ropes had given way, they had hurryingly backed away, undoubtedly questioning the wisdom of setting him free, his immense height and built, which far surpassed their mother's or even Auntie Shrew's, much less their own, making them nervous.

Josh knelt before them, to meet their gaze. Unzipping his pants pocket, he took out Cynthia's doll and presented it to her, "You dropped this back there sweetie…" Cynthia, still cowering shyly behind her big sister, and clutching Josh's loaded gun under her arm, at the sight of her favourite doll, was finally coaxed into coming out. Slowly approaching the human, she retrieved her doll, while Josh retrieved his gun, and tucked it safely away, breathing a sigh of relief.

"Cynthia, what do we say?" said Teresa, as her little sister lovingly cuddled her doll, all interest in the gun or her fear of the human before her entirely forgotten. The little mouse shyly looked up at Josh, muttering, "Thank you."

"You are welcome sweetie pie," replied Josh calmly, reaching forward to ruffle her hair but the young mouse backed away, out of his reach. Although they had definitely reached a certain level of trust between them, the children still weren't ready for any physical interaction with him. But maybe it was just as well. Before anyone could say another word, another familiar voice was heard from nearby.

"…Come on then, you old flim-flam. I have left the children all alone with that ruffian human!" It was Auntie Shrew, returning with help, to remove Josh. It was time to say goodbye. Hastily retrieving his kit, Josh turned to the children.

"Well, I guess this is where we say goodbye," he said, "Thank you for listening to me. Maybe someday I will repay the favour…"

"Wait, you don't have to leave," said Martin, looking kind of sad that their once-in-a-lifetime visitor was leaving so soon, "We can still explain to our mother. I am sure she will be happy to let you stay…"

"I am sorry kids," said Josh, feeling just as sad of being forced to leave himself, to keep his presence secret. But the thought of those rats tracking him down here and maybe harming this nice family for hiding him would be too much for his conscience. No, it would be best if he went his own way now and the quicker they forgot about him the better, "It's for your own good that I must leave without any further introductions. Remember, if anyone comes here asking about me, tell them you've never seen me…" He turned to leave.

"Won't we ever meet again?" asked Cynthia and Josh was surprised to see she looked the saddest of all; for returning her favourite doll to her, the young mouse had developed an instant liking for this human.

"Like I said sweetie, someday I may drop out of the sky again. But until then, au revoir!"

"Wait," Teresa called, as Josh hurried away, "What is your name?"

"Josh," called the astronaut over his shoulder, before disappearing into the woods from where he had come. Martin turned to his siblings, who were looking just as bewildered as he was.

"What was that all about?"

When Auntie Shrew arrived a short while later, accompanied by a very irritated Mr Ages, both carrying restraining harnesses, she was outraged to find the 'thief' had escaped. The children had wisely denied any part in the escape, claiming the human had simply escaped on his own accord when they weren't looking. Mr Ages was furious at being interrupted from his work and dragged all the way here on account of a children's hoax; when Auntie Shrew had furiously reprimanded him, pointing out that she had seen this human too, Ages had rounded on her instead, accusing her of wasting his time with another of her paranoid fantasies.

The argument between the two adult mice soon turned hot, until a hysterical Auntie Shrew had chased the red-faced Ages away with her walking stick, after he had called her a rather offensive name, while the children looked on, overwhelmed with laughter.

At dinner that evening, Mrs Brisby couldn't figure out what was causing all this excitement amongst her children, which were constantly whispering to each other across the table about some 'human from the stars having come to visit them.' When Cynthia, always the chatterbox in the family, had tried explaining to their mother of their encounter today (Martin had hastily clapped his hand over her mouth, threatening to tickle her senseless if she said anything more), Mrs Brisby had simply dismissed it as some new game her children were playing.

Following her husband's death, it always pained her to see her children without the support and company of a fatherly figure; seeing them happy, even by living in their own little magical world of make-belief, to take their minds off the absence of her beloved Jonathan was just fine with her. Her main concern at the moment was her youngest son Timothy, who had been feeling unwell all day and still showing no signs of getting better, his fever rising rapidly.

Little did Mrs Brisby realise that day that her son's illness would soon lead to an encounter, resulting in a chain of events, that would eventually change their lives forever…

**Author's note:** My sincere apologies for the long delay but I have been battling a severe case of writer's block. Believe me when I say that I have been stuck with this chapter for nearly two weeks! Anyway, coming up next, Josh meets Mrs Brisby for the first time and the story continues with canon events. ENJOY AND PLEASE REVIEW!


	6. Chapter 6 Timothy Brisby's Sickness

**Location: Nimh-Beta Forest Uplands, close to the Lee of the Stone. **

New Mission Time: Day 5

For the next three days, Josh stayed well clear of the Lee of the Stone, leaving his shelter only for supplies and exercise. He had also refrained from building fires and stayed well alert every time he ventured outside the hollow. Although he had made sure to cover up all evidence of his visit, and had even watched Auntie Shrew being shrugged off through his binoculars, he still feared someone might pressure the children into giving him away.

So far he had been unable to re-establish contact with the _NIMH-1_; he had tried setting up his transmitter on the forest floor but without picking up any homing signal from his mother ship or any of her pods. To make matters worse, the Lee of the Stone was situated in a valley, reducing his instrument inception radius to roughly 50 miles, and had gotten nothing from orbit because of the storm interference; he needed someplace high to set up the ELFPCRT for full range transmissions. Unfortunately, the only high point around here was the peculiarly shaped rock formation which gave this place its name, with the Brisby farm situated right beside it, making it impossible to reach it without risking exposing himself again.

Meanwhile, the cold was intensifying; as he couldn't risk building a fire, whether it was day or night, he could only rely on his space suit to keep warm at night. But even though he could recharge the thermal batteries during the day, providing him with enough heat and light for the night, he knew he couldn't go on like this. Once winter came, the weather would probably blot out the suns, making it impossible to keep recharging his suit batteries. At that point, he would inevitably be forced to start building fires to stay alive; and even then, his shelter wouldn't be enough to sustain him throughout, what would probably turn out to be, the longest Arctic winter any human being had ever experienced. Not to mention the problem regarding food…

His emergency rations were nearly depleted; even by restricting himself to a third of the daily allowance recommended in the manual, he was already down to his last energy bar, which would run out within another day or two. The wild fruits of the forest could not last him through the winter months either, as they quickly spoiled. He had considered hunting for his food and using the cold as a refrigerant for his game but then realised that he wouldn't be the only hungry creature out here; without someplace to keep an ample supply of food safely in storage, every predator in this forest would be upon his larder the instant they picked up the scent. And there probably wouldn't be much game to be found during the freeze anyway. The bottom line was obvious: unless he could find some appropriate shelter for himself and supplies, his survival was in jeopardy. But where?

From his survival training, Josh knew, under the current situation, the best place to find refuge was underground. Unfortunately, the terrain in these parts was more or less flat, without mountains or any likely place to find caves and other natural-occurring shelters. And he didn't have the tools to build one himself in time. What was he going to do?

He had combed every inch of the forest, looking for a suitable location for a winter shelter; nothing but trees and rock piles. Several times he had considered returning to the Lee of the Stone and stealing some of those large woodman's axes he had seen, to try and built himself a log cabin. But he knew that if that old mouse Auntie Shrew caught him there again, she'd turn him in to the Rats for sure. Little did he realise that the key to finding shelter was only a matter of an unexpected encounter, which occurred only a few days after the incident in the cornfield.

On the fifth day on Nimh-Beta, following another chilly night in the tree, Josh found himself down by a nearby waterhole, having a bath and a shave. Stripped down to his underwear, his clothes and space suit hanging on some nearby branches to dry, Josh took out the electric razor from his hygiene kit and trimmed the itchy beard growing from his chin, using the surface of the water as a mirror. Soap was scarce and he wanted to make it last for as long as possible, so he took great care in using sparingly, by dissolving a small chip of the bar in a bowl of water to wash in, constantly reminding himself that he couldn't afford any Earthly luxuries at the moment.

Some time later, after he was done, he was just doing up his flight uniform when he heard a commotion coming from nearby: a somewhat familiar, desperate feminine voice screaming for help. The rustling in the trees told Josh that, whoever it was out there in trouble, was running from something…or someone. Hastily grabbing his gun, he crept closer to investigate. Pushing aside some ferns, his eyes fell upon a scene of utmost terror.

Before him was another of those humanoid mice, lying cowering on the ground, her foot caught in the crack between two thick tree roots. And towering above her was a gigantic rattlesnake, enlarged to beyond the size of the largest serpents ever found on Earth, ready to strike. It seemed she had been running from the beast and hadn't been looking where she was going, getting herself trapped; now the hungry serpent had its ghastly mouth wide open, its poisonous fangs exposed, its forked tongue tasting the air, preparing to devour its helpless soon-to-be prey.

Snapping out of his trance of terror, Josh sprang into action. Raising his gun, he fired a shot, which found the monster right in the mouth; the snake hissed in agony as the electric bullet blew a sizzling hole straight through the back of its head. Mortally wounded, the killer reptile began thrashed about in its death agonies, its charred head slamming into Josh and sending him flying, before it crumpled to the ground lifeless.

Groaning in pain, his ribs aching from the blow, Josh pulled himself to his feet, breathing a sigh of relief to see the monster dead. Then he noticed the mouse the snake had been trying to kill; the poor creature was lying curled up in a ball, her face buried in her hands, trembling violently from shock, but otherwise unhurt. Looking again, he recognised her as the children's mother from the farm, Mrs Brisby. What was she doing out here on her own?

For in instant, Josh was tempted to take to his heels and go; the mouse was alive and out of harm's way, so she could go on her way when she recovered. But seeing her looking so frail and terrified, and all alone, got the better of him; swallowing his sense of safety, he hurried over to help her. The lady mouse hadn't noticed him yet, having passed out from fear; her woollen cape was torn from where the snake's fangs had grazed her, but fortunately there were no bite wounds, which would have been unquestionably fatal, given that monster's size. Likewise, her pulse felt strong and regular, indicating she had had a lucky escape. At that moment, she began to stir…

Elizabeth Brisby was walking by herself, making her way back from Mr Ages' home with some medicine for Timothy. For the past three days, her son had been bedridden, his fever high, his illness persisting relentlessly. All her attempts to bring that horrible fever down with hot broths and willow bark tea had been fruitless. Then, just this morning, with her son now delirious and likely to slip away at any moment, the desperate mother mouse had turned to her last resort: the old, eccentric mouse alchemist and his crazy concoctions.

Ages had been as irritable as always for being disturbed, still sore about his scuffle with Auntie Shrew, but had thankfully agreed to help. Analysing the symptoms up top of his head, he had diagnosed Timothy with pneumonia and given Mrs Brisby a pouch of some grains of antipyretic salts he had been experimenting with - commonly known by the human race back on Earth as quinine -, with instructions to keep her son warm and confined to bed for the next several weeks, giving him the medicine in a broth at daily intervals.

Realising her son's life was in great danger, Mrs Brisby had thanked Mr Ages and hurried home, hoping she wasn't too late. Unfortunately, in her anxiety and careful not to spill the medicine, she had wondered off the path and gotten lost. In these woods, every sensible mouse knew better than to wonder off alone unless there was no other choice, and always to stay alert; only in her case, her worrying for her son's life and dreading the thought that she might already be too late, had made her negate any sense of self-caution.

It had happened so fast; one instant she had stopped to catch her breath and try and get back her bearings, when she found herself being chased by the hungry snake. Running for her life, with the reptilian killer in hot pursuit, she hadn't gotten far. With her foot snagged under a tree root, she watched helplessly as the predator raised its massive head, its fang-lined mouth agape, preparing to swallow her whole. Resigning herself to her fate, the torturous thought of what would become of her children, which would now be growing up as orphans because of her carelessness, playing over in her mind, Mrs Brisby braced herself for the horrible demise mice often met in this world.

_I am so sorry Jonathan. I let our children down…_

But the agonising pain of those massive, poisonous fangs sinking into her flesh never came; her tearful eyes shut tight in terror, she suddenly heard a thunderous noise, unlike anything she had ever heard before, the snake hissing loudly, as if in pain, followed by a loud thud, and then there was only silence. What had happened? Too scared to open her eyes or even move, Mrs Brisby couldn't take this nightmare any longer and felt herself sink into unconsciousness.

She didn't know how long she lay there, before she woke, feeling someone gently caressing her. As it all came back to her, she shuddered; was she dead? This was what the ultimate end was all about? Slowly, she opened her eyes, half-expecting to see her beloved Jonathan again, whom she'd missed so much, only to encounter a new shock.

Crouching above her was the strangest-looking creature she had ever seen; although very similar to her in many ways, with two arms and two legs, he was unlike any mouse or rat she had ever seen before, completely furless and wearing this alien outfit, which resembled a suit of armour (Josh's space suit). On the breastplate she could see letters spelling out the name ANDERSON, as well as a peculiar owl engraving bearing the words NIMH-1, neither of which made any sense to her.

Currently, the stranger was kneeling beside her, looking concerned, if not a bit weary at seeing her awake, yet she couldn't quite figure him out; who – or rather _what_ – was he and what did he want with her? Mrs Brisby was neither a fearless nor a strong mouse, while this stranger, almost twice her size and with his strange appearance, looked fearsome and intimidating. She wanted to scream but the sight of this alien creature kept her petrified with amazement. Her temporary amazement was broken however as she saw the human suddenly take out a knife.

"No!" With her foot still trapped and unable to try and run, in an instant, she had curled up in a ball again, expecting to die, "Please, I beg you, think of my children!" she cried, "I am all they have in the world…" The stranger seemed slightly taken aback by her fear but didn't back away as he reached out for her. She half-expected him to go ahead and run her through with that knife, but instead he spoke in a kind voice, very unlike his intimidating appearance.

"Take it easy there, little lady. I mean you no harm. I am only trying to help you…" It was only then that Mrs Brisby noticed the unmoving carcass of the dead snake in the grass beside them, realising that it had been this strange human who had saved her from a terrible death…

Josh froze as he watched the mouse he had just saved gasp in fear as she laid eyes upon him. This time, the cat was definitely out of the bag; they'd be no way to conceal his presence if she decided to give him away, so he might as well see this ride through. In spite of his uncertainty of how things were likely to turn out for him now, he couldn't help but notice just how pretty she was; her well-groomed, chocolate-brown fur curled around her sweet face, her stunning, sapphire-blue eyes staring back at him in fear.

_Oh, well, you probably did feel pretty much the same when you encountered those damn rats back at the lake_, he thought, drawing his knife to free her from her entrapment. At the sight of the gleaming blade of the Swiss Army knife flipping open in his hand, the mouse lost it and began to panic, undoubtedly thinking he was about to hurt her. Amidst her cries for mercy, Josh struggled to calm her down so he could free her. His kind voice seemed to ease her up somewhat as she managed to get a grip on herself, yet continued to stare fearfully at Josh, uncertain of what to make of him.

Satisfied that she wouldn't try and struggle and maybe hurt herself, Josh got to work. Sliding his knife in the gap between the two roots where her foot was snagged, he slowly managed to pry the snare-like grip loose, so she could pull free, "There you go. See? No harm done." The instant she had pulled free, Josh had expected her to bolt but she stayed where she was, her curiosity finally overpowering. Although she kept her distance, she definitely seemed intrigued by her saviour.

"T…Thank you, sir," she mumbled, staring up at Josh with wide eyes, yet the man was glad that at least she wasn't trembling with fear anymore, "I owe you my life. But what…I mean, _who_ are you?" she said, weary of insulting this strange being that had just pulled her out of the jaws of death.

"Captain Josh Anderson, _NIMH-1_ Mission. I come from planet Earth," said Josh, introducing himself, remembering his manners with the ladies, as he offered his hand to shake. The mother mouse hesitated for a moment but then timidly offered her hand as well.

"I am Elizabeth Brisby," she said, finally smiling at Josh. Her voice was as kind and as warm-hearted as her good looks. Josh politely kissed her hand, glad to see his gamble by revealing himself to the inhabitants of this strange planet may actually have been worth it. Then he suddenly realised she couldn't stand, clutching her ankle in pain.

"Are you all right? Does it hurt?" Josh said, hurrying up to catch her before she could trip, "Here, let me look at it." Helping her to sit down on a nearby rock and placing her foot up onto his lap, he took out his HHC and performed an x-ray. The scan revealed a clear image of the leg bones, but no traces of red, indicating no fractures, aside from some mild swelling in the joint area.

"You're lucky Mrs Mouse, it seems there's nothing broken. I think you've just sprained it," said Josh, gently massaging her injured ankle with the skill of a trained medic. Opening up his survival kit, he took out the first aid for some bandages and the icepack, "May I ask what you were doing out here all alone?"

"My son Timothy has fallen ill with a fever," she explained, wincing slightly at Josh's touch as he applied the icepack but enjoying it at the same time, "I had gone to see my neighbour Mr Ages for some medicine…" She suddenly gasped, remembering, "Oh no, Timmy's medicine…! I lost it…" She broke down crying, looking awfully distraught. Josh, who had just finished bandaging up her ankle, felt his heart melt at the sight of this beautiful creature looking so upset. Tenderly, he reached out and gently pulled her into a comforting embrace.

"There, there, everything will be fine," he said reassuringly, letting her cry on his shoulder, "Come on now, don't cry…" Mrs Brisby seemed to calm down somewhat but it still didn't easy her worrying in the slightest.

"What am I going to do? Mr Ages said he was leaving for Rosebush City tonight for some urgent business and wouldn't be back until next week. Timmy can't hold out that long without medicine…" But Josh, who had been considering the alternatives, tried to reassure her.

"Don't worry, I'll help you in any way I can. Now then, what kind of illness is it? Did this Mr Ages give you a diagnosis of any kind?" Mrs Brisby struggled to think, remembering the old healer mouse's gibberish from earlier that evening.

"Mr Ages called it…pneumonia I think," she explained, "He said it could be fatal if untreated… Oh my goodness, my little Timmy…" But Josh, well accustomed to always keeping a cool head in a crisis, had a potential solution in mind: the ampoule of emergency Dex in his medical kit. Although it was only a general anti-inflammatory, he was sure it was much stronger than any herbal remedy he was likely to find out here. That would make a perfect temporary solution for young Timothy Brisby…assuming of course it had no ill effects on the metabolism of a giant mouse, for which it had obviously never been tested. On the other hand, he knew pneumonia was a serious ailment for a child, and by the sound of it there wasn't much time to spare. For an instant, he wished his friend Dr Boniface was down here with him; good old Gordon, the medical genius, would have been able to give him all the answers in a heartbeat. Still, Josh knew he was his own medic now and he would just have to do his best.

"How long has he been feeling off-colour?" he asked, remembering what he had overheard back when he had been eavesdropping on Mrs Brisby and her daughter a few days ago, where he had heard young Teresa mention her brother was not feeling well, "Three, four days?" Mrs Brisby nodded grimly, not bothering to ask how he knew.

"All right, then that doesn't give us a whole lot of time," Josh said, thinking hard on his space medical training. With Timothy sick, he would need to be given the Dex as soon as possible; and that would mean another trip back to the Lee of the Stone. Did he dare go there again? He had been lucky to get away the first time; but knowing a child was dying down there, he couldn't possibly refuse to help this desperate mother now. He would just have to chance it and hope Mrs Brisby could vouch for him.

"I'll come with you and see what I can do to help your son. I am sure I can do something," he said, silently cursing himself for doing something so stupid again. Why was he risking his own safety for a giant talking mouse he hardly knew, while he should be lying low, waiting for a rescue to get him off this godforsaken planet?

_Your blasted nobility will rub off on you one of these days Joshua_, he thought. Mrs Brisby however looked delighted.

"You will help my Timothy? Oh, thank you! Thank you so much!" she cried, grabbing Josh into a hug, catching him by surprise. Even though she was petite, she could hug pretty tight, accidentally pressing against his bruised ribs, where the snake had hit him. The man's groan of pain made her pull back in alarm, "Are you…are you hurt?"

"Blasted thing slammed into me when I shot it. Nothing serious, just some bruising I think…" Josh muttered hastily, nursing his bruised ribs. Although luckily there didn't seem to be anything broken, he wouldn't have turned down the icepack he had wasted right now. Mrs Brisby however looked most concerned as she took his hand.

"Come with me. When we get home, I'll find something for you…" It was only then that she realised she could only limp a few paces because of her sprained ankle. The Lee of the Stone was a good mile walk and meanwhile it was getting dark. In another hour, this place would be crawling with more predators, making it extremely dangerous to be outside. Mrs Brisby clutched her injured ankle, "I don't think I can get very far on this…"

"That's no problem. Allow me," Josh said, suddenly scooping her up into his arms. In spite of his aching ribs, the feeling of having the warm body of this beautiful creature pressed against him gave him strength. Mrs Brisby seemed caught by surprise for an instant but then smiled at the noble gesture.

"You are a real gentleman Captain Anderson," she said, battling her eyelashes at him. Whoever this strange human was, he had definitely won her liking. Josh smiled.

"Just preserving the good old British code of etiquette," he said, always a gentleman with the ladies, a trait of his he took great pride in, "And please, just call me Josh; only my iron-fisted Commander ever calls me by my rank." Carrying the mother mouse in his arms, and his survival kit, containing the medicine for Timothy Brisby, on his shoulders, he set off once again for the Lee of the Stone, hoping to receive a better welcome this time…

Meanwhile, back at the Lee of the Stone, the Brisby household was buzzing with nervousness and worry. Teresa, Martin and Cynthia, left under the supervision of Auntie Shrew, were pacing around the kitchen anxiously, waiting for their mother to return with the medicine. In the children's bedroom next door, their brother Timothy lay burning up in bed, growing quieter and quieter by the minute as the last of his strength slowly left him.

Teresa sat with Cynthia and Auntie Shrew at the table by the fire, while Martin paced impatiently around, muttering possible scenarios of what could be taking their mother so long, and getting on Auntie Shrew's nerves. While little Cynthia pestered their great aunt for attention, Teresa sat in silence, worrying about her sick brother and her mother who was late. It was already past sundown and still no sign of her. What could be keeping her? Mr Ages was not the one to keep visitors around for so long…

Every so often, her mind would wonder off to that strange human they had encountered a few days ago; could that stranger, hiding out there, be the reason their mother was late? Maybe he had done something to her? Perhaps they should have listened to Auntie Shrew and let someone else handle him? Trying to ignore the quarrel that had broken out between Martin and Auntie Shrew – a common occurrence when those two were stuck in the same room for too long – Teresa struggled to banish those fearful thoughts from her mind, reassuring herself that everything would be fine…

Meanwhile, outside in the garden patch of the Brisby home, Josh made his way to the front door, still carrying the young widow in his arms. Carrying her up to the front door – a rough design, fashioned out of several stout logs lashed together with twine, and without any doorknob or handle -, he finally put her down, helping her keep her balance on one good leg. They could hear voices inside, arguing. A familiar elderly voice seemed to be scolding the children.

"…Cast not pearls before swine, I always say, and that includes impudent piglets. Good night!" They heard some heavy steps marching up to the door, a scream, and then what sounded like a large, water-filled beech ball tumbling down a flight of stairs. The children's laughter carried all the way up to the door.

"That's Auntie Shrew," said Mrs Brisby, pushing the door open and leading Josh inside, "She raised me after my parents died when I was little. Now she looks after my children when I am away…" The interior of the Brisby home came as quite a surprise to Josh, who had been expecting a trench dug-out laden with straw bedding at best; instead, the interior was warm and welcoming, not unlike a country cottage back on Earth.

With stone boulders and wooden beams reinforcing the earthen walls, the Brisby home had the basic architecture of a fallout shelter, only with a more rustic look about it. A massive tree root protruding from the floor by the entrance had been carved into a flight of stairs, leading downstairs to the kitchen. With a massive stone fireplace providing heat and light, the kitchen, with its rough straw panelling, consisted of a large, well-scrubbed table, some benches and stools, and a dresser filled with earthenware pottery and dishes. The dirt floor was covered in giant rabbitskin rugs, making the place look cosy and welcoming.

Josh instantly recognised Teresa, Martin and Cynthia, staring at Auntie Shrew with sad-puppy-dog looks, who was lying on her head at the foot of the stairs, tangled in her large shawl – well, except for Martin, who was rolling on the floor with laughter at the prank he had just pulled to get even with her for telling him off. Josh had to hide his snort of amusement at the sight of the mean-tempered old mouse, who had clobbered him over the head with a hoe only a few days ago, being driven insane by children's innocent pranks. Mrs Brisby however, didn't seem to find it funny.

"Martin!" she scolded her son, "Auntie Shrew, whatever is going on here?" The old mouse scrambled to her feet, red in the face and very cross.

"Indeed!" she shouted, "About time you showed up, Brisby! I am just about on my last nerve with that brat son of yours… Him!" The tension suddenly died down and all eyes turned to Josh as he stepped into the parlour, helping a limping Mrs Brisby along. Auntie Shrew was the first to recover; thumping up the stairs, brandishing her walking stick like a sword, she growled at Josh with utmost hatred and distrust.

"You again! Get your filthy hands off my niece this instant! How dare you show your thieving face around here, you scoundrel! Get out! Out, I say!" She raised her walking stick to run Josh out the door but was stopped by Mrs Brisby.

"Auntie Shrew, please! He means no harm! He saved my life in the forest today. He might be able to help Timmy…" Auntie Shrew rounded on her niece.

"What did you bring this riff-raff here for? Are you out of your mind? Outsiders like him can't be trusted! Whatever lies he's fed you, he'll probably backstab you at the first given opportunity…!"

"Excuse me, ma'am," snapped Josh coolly, "But I am not the one here with the unfortunate habit of striking people over the head when they're not looking, and tying them up!" Mrs Brisby looked curiously between Josh and Auntie Shrew, wondering what they were talking about. Downstairs, the children were also voicing their own opinion of Auntie Shrew's conservative judgement, Martin being the best of all. Seeing that she was fighting a losing battle, Auntie Shrew turned back to her niece, speaking in a softer, yet still disapproving, tone.

"Very well then. I am not in charge of this household, so it isn't my place to dismiss any visitors your let in," she huffed in defeat, "But I do hope you realise what you're doing, especially for the children's sake – ill-mannered brats as they may be." She shot Martin a glare, who only pulled a face at her in response but recoiled under his mother's stern glare.

"And as for you, hoodlum," she said, poking Josh roughly in the chest with her walking stick in warning (only it didn't do anything against the titanium breastplate of his space suit), "I'll be keeping a close watch on you and if I find you're trying to bring trouble upon my niece's very, very odd family, you will rue the day you were born! Good night!"

Without another word, she turned and strode out the door with a huff, muttering about deceiving troublemakers and naïve young lady mice. Mrs Brisby turned to her children with an angry glare. She clearly wasn't pleased with their behaviour towards Auntie Shrew.

"Well children, now you've done it!" she scolded them, "Auntie Shrew means well; she only wants to help. And this is a very poor way to repay her." Although she rarely lost her temper with them like their father sometimes used to, the disappointment in her voice always got the message across. Martin looked hurt, while Teresa, the least guilty, looked reproachfully at her ashamed brother with crossed arms. Cynthia however, was only staring shyly at Josh from behind her big sister's skirt, uninterested in her brother being told off.

"I am sorry, Mother…"

The grim atmosphere quickly faded however as Mrs Brisby introduced Josh to her children (she seemed rather surprised when they told her they had already met), and the circumstances of how she had met him. Teresa and Cynthia were struck dumb with awe when she told them about the snake attack and how Josh had saved her and offered to help Timothy when she discovered she had lost Mr Ages' medicine. Martin meanwhile had gone into another of his bravado outbursts.

"I should have been there! I am not afraid of some big, stupid snake! I would have given him what for…!" He paraded around, swinging his stick in a mock-fight. Chuckling in amusement, Josh playfully grabbed the young mouse, ruffling his hair, while his sisters looked on, giggling, "Hold your horses, tiger! It takes quite a bit more to reduce a monster like that to a pair of shoes and a fancy belt!" But this was not the right time to be playing games with the children, as Mrs Brisby reminded them that their youngest brother needed help.

Leading Josh through a doorway obscured by a curtain, just off the kitchen, they entered, what was presumably, the children's bedroom. Four roughly carved, children-sized beds with rabbit skin duvets, decorated with painted flowers, some scattered homemade toys, and a small fireplace providing light and heat, testified to the meagre means of living the Brisbies had.

Lying sleeping on one of the beds in the far corner was a young boy mouse of around seven, looking terribly ill and weak, every few seconds coughing and shivering from a chill in his sleep, testifying to his grave illness. Young Timothy Brisby lay burning up in bed, at the mercy of nature's relentless pathogen.

Mrs Brisby knelt beside her sick son, tenderly stroking his hair, "Timmy, wake up my son. I have brought some help for you. Wake up, please." Timmy's eyes opened briefly but he had no strength left to greet his mother, other than shoot her a pained smile of recognition. Josh took the boy's hand and felt his pulse; it was racing like a steam engine. Running his hand across his forehead, his temperature felt like that of a boiling kettle. He didn't need instruments to realise that the disease was nearing its final stages.

Taking out his HHC, he activated the medical scan mode; the x-ray revealed severe inflammation in the lungs, among other critical bio-med readings, which came up in red on the flexible screen. Running a diagnosis program, the evaluation confirmed the seriousness of the situation:

MEDICAL ANALYSIS:

SEVERE INFLAMMATION ASSOCIATED WITH PATHOGEN CONTAMINATION DETECTED IN RESPIRATORY SYSTEM

CORE TEMPERATURE: 110

PULSE RATE: 165bpm

RESPIRATION LEVEL: CRITICAL

IMMEDIATE ADMINISTRATION OF ANTI-INFLAMMATORY DRUG, SERIAL NUMBER DEX-065/012, AND INITIATION OF LEVEL-1 BIOHAZARD TREATMENT PROTOCOL RECOMMENDED

Setting down the survival kit on a nearby bed, Josh unwrapped the medical kit. In a side pocket, he found the single ampoule of Dex he carried. Taking out the kit's syringe gun and hypodermic needle, he turned to Mrs Brisby.

"While I am getting this ready, I need you to get some water – don't warm it up – and some towels we can use to try and bring down the fever. Also, he will have to be given plenty of liquids every few hours to prevent dehydration." Without questioning his instructions, Mrs Brisby hurried back to the kitchen to get the water and towels as instructed, her eldest daughter hurrying over to help her. The rest of the children gathered around their sick brother, looking scared. Josh pitied them; the sight of such a horrible illness in its advanced stages was not a pretty sight.

"Is Timmy going to die?" asked Cynthia, looking on the verge of tears, as she gently tucked her doll beneath her sick brother's arm, as if to keep him company.

"No sweetheart, he is just very sick," said Mrs Brisby, hurrying over with a ball of water, Teresa bringing the towels.

"Your brother has just got a touch of pneumonia sweetie," explained Josh, trying to reassure her, "But don't you worry; I'm going to fix him up good as new…" At that moment, they were all caught by surprise as they heard Timmy speak.

"Dad…? Is that you…?" To everyone's surprise, it was directed to non other than Josh, the boy's bloodshot eyes, only a fraction open, staring unfocused in his direction. His siblings seemed to lose it as they started muttering nervously to each other.

"Of course he isn't Dad, Timmy, you dunderhead! Dad is long dead…!" said Martin but Teresa slapped him over the head to shut him up. Josh however, who could recognise fever delirium when he saw it, realised they had to hurry. On his instruction, they applied the wet towels to the boy's forehead, relieving his burning temperature somewhat. Timmy continued to stare at Josh even in his state of semi consciousness.

"Who…who are you…?" he asked, his voice raspy and weak. Mrs Brisby reached over and kissed her youngest son's cheek, trying to reassure him, "Someone who is going to make you feel better Timmy. You just try and go back to sleep dear." Josh also patted the boy's hand reassuringly, doubling his efforts.

Extracting the drug from its ampoule into the syringe gun, he removed the safety cap from the needle, preparing to administer the shot that just might spare the poor boy from that horrible disease. Mrs Brisby, who was feverishly soaking Timmy's forehead with cool water, gasped as she saw Josh about to stick her son with that long, gleaming needle, "W…what are you going to do with that?"

"The medicine has to be injected into his bloodstream so it can do is job. Don't worry, it's perfectly safe." Whatever few remedies Mrs Brisby knew about mostly involved herbs, which were usually administered in hot drinks, the concept of injections and microbiology completely unfamiliar to her. Fortunately, she didn't argue as she helped roll Timmy over so Josh could give him the shot.

After they had helped the boy swallow some water mixed with powdered aspirin, there was nothing more left to do but wait and hope that Josh's strange medicine worked its miracle. Whispering to her children to keep their voices down so their brother could have all the peace and quiet he could get, he ordered them off to bed. It was the end of a long, eventful day for the whole family…

Josh sat waiting in the kitchen while Mrs Brisby tucked her children into bed, singing them their favourite lullaby (_Dream by Night, Sleep by Day_), admiring the strong bond between the members of this family, slightly envying their happiness. He could hardly remember his own mother's affection, as she had died when he was around Timmy's age, while his father had deserted the family when he was still a baby. His aunt and uncle had always been as firm disciplinarians as bossy Auntie Shrew and, while they had never mistreated him, his childhood had hardly been one filled with the love of a mother as caring as Mrs Brisby.

_Then again, she is a natural mother at heart_, he thought with a smile, as Mrs Brisby put out the oil lamp in the bedroom and returned to the kitchen. She smiled at Josh.

"They're sleeping finally," she said, "My goodness, they kept asking me all about you. I think they like you…" Josh chuckled.

"Well, that's good to hear." Then he noticed she was still limping from her injured leg, "How's your ankle doing?"

"Feels much better now, thank you," she said, walking over to a straw cupboard and taking out a jug of some sweet-smelling beverage resembling wine. Pouring two wooden mugs, the led Josh before the fire, as they made themselves comfortable on the soft rabbit skin hearthrugs. She passed him a mug.

"Thank you," said Josh politely, taking a sip. It was unlike any homemade wine he had ever tasted but it was pleasant nonetheless, "I am sorry to drop in on you at such a bad time…"

"Anyone who helps my sick child is welcome in my home. My mother always told me it was only right that we repay any favours in kind," she said firmly, "Please don't let Auntie Shrew's behaviour give you any bad impression; she can be eccentric at times but she means no ill will."

"Don't mention it, no offence taken," Josh said, turning to look at a family portrait hanging above the mantelpiece. He could recognise the entire Brisby family posing for the painter, including a handsome-looking male mouse holding Mrs Brisby's hand and bouncing a toddler Timmy on his lap, "Is that your husband?" Mrs Brisby's smile fell.

"Yes, that's Jonathan," she said, "He died a few years ago, during one of his secret missions with the Rats…" At the mention of the family having contacts with the Rats, Josh grew uneasy. He turned to Mrs Brisby.

"Do pardon my boldness, Mrs Brisby, but about these Rats, do you still retain any close contacts with them? Do they come up here often…?" The mouse seemed a bit surprised at his sudden sense of urgency but calmly explained.

"Well, no, not since my husband's death," she said, sighing as some of her worst memories resurfaced, "Although my neighbour Mr Ages does because of his work. Our last visitor was one of his friends, a fellow called Justin, who came to return me Jonathan's papers and personal effects. They said his body had been lost out in the desert and could not be retrieved for burial…" She stifled a sob and Josh realised he had gone a bit too far with his questioning.

"I am sorry," he said, "It's just that I don't want to bring any trouble upon you and your family, if they show up here, looking for me…"

"You needn't worry about that, Josh," she said kindly, "They have no business here and they always respected Jonathan's privacy. But why were you running from them anyway?" she asked, suddenly sounding suspicious. Josh launched into his story of how he had come to this planet and all his escapades that had eventually brought him all the way to the Lee of the Stone, including his encounter with the two savage rats back at the _Scout_ crash site.

"They didn't give me a single word of warning," he explained, "The instant they saw me, they just moved in for the kill, completely unprovoked. That's why I was hiding out there…"

Mrs Brisby listened intently, struggling to conceive the very idea that her visitor actually came from another world from way across the heavens. The concept of building machines that could fly was regarded by many as pure fantasy, let alone space travel, which went beyond her wildest imagination. In spite of her ignorance however – and her growing curiosity – she now realised her new friend was in quite a difficult position, stranded and alone. And she was determined to do something about it. She approached the man.

"Josh, why don't you stay with us? I would be happy to put you up, until your friends come for you. And I am sure my children would be delighted to have you around. What do you say?" Josh, who had been about to say he'd be on his way in the morning before he became a burden to them, was caught by surprise. At this point, he could either accept or turn down the invitation.

Although still weary of the Rats tracing him here before the NIMH-1 could send a rescue, which could land the entire Brisby family in trouble for harbouring him, declining would only put him back in the wilderness, with the threat of the dawning winter not far off.

_The dice has been rolled_, he thought, resigning himself for the inevitable, before finally nodding in agreement. Mrs Brisby did smile with joy!

Later that night, Mrs Brisby got out of bed and tiptoed over to the spare bed on the other side of the room, where Josh slept. The astronaut had removed his space suit and service uniform, leaving only his underpants and t-shirt on. She smiled, watching him sleeping peacefully. He was snoring slightly but pleasantly, unlike Auntie Shrew's snoring, which would make the furniture rock around the room all night. Staring beneath his t-shirt, she suddenly noticed the bruising the snake had given him.

Taking out one of her mother's special ointments from the bedside table, she noiselessly mixed the ground-up herbs in a paste and gently treated the man's bruises with it. Josh groaned slightly in his sleep but didn't stir. Bandaging his hurt ribs, Mrs Brisby pulled the blanket back over him, making him as comfortable as possible, before returning to bed.

For hours she lay thinking, reflecting on how she had met Jonathan under similar circumstances all those years ago. He too had been as noble and as warm-hearted as this Josh Anderson. In a way it saddened her that he wasn't a mouse like her… Timmy mistaking him for her late husband in the midst of his delirium had almost caused her heart to melt. But in spite of her thoughts, she was exhausted and soon drifted off to sleep as well.

**Author's note:** So now Josh is staying with the Brisbies. Coming up next, his attempts to regain contact with the NIMH-1 begin, while Jenner slowly begins to pick up his trail… Enjoy and please review!


	7. Chapter 7 Mrs Brisby's Houseguest

**Location: The Brisby Farm, the Lee of the Stone. **

New Mission Time: Day 6

Josh woke from a blissful sleep unlike any he had had in a long time. Back on Earth, in his London apartment, his mornings were always filled with the annoying sounds of loud traffic and noisy people; and on the _NIMH-1_, he always slept by the sounds of the ship's constantly running machinery and computers. But here, the peaceful sounds of the breeze and the surrounding forest, combined with the fact that he was finally sleeping in a _real bed_ and under the roof of a _real house_, rather than curling up in his spacesuit in a tree hollow, made sleeping a very pleasant experience indeed.

Glancing over at his host's bed, he saw it was empty, and the appetising smell from the kitchen told him Mrs Brisby was already up and about, tending to her family. Feeling his hurt ribs where the snake had slammed into him yesterday, he found she had treated and bandaged up the bruising while he had been sleeping, which was healing up nicely. His uniform sat at the foot of the bed, neatly folded-up and cleaned. He smiled.

_This girl really is the soul of hospitality. Such a pity there aren't many of them left these days._

Yawning, he stretched and got up to dress. He was just doing up his uniform, when he realised he wasn't completely alone after all; peeping curiously at him from behind the curtain in the doorway were Teresa and Cynthia. He smiled at them, causing them to squeal and bolt in embarrassment; he then heard Mrs Brisby's voice, who must have also seen them spying on him from the kitchen.

"Children! What have I told you about peeping? It's rude! And Captain Anderson needs rest…"

"It's all right, I'm up," said Josh, straitening his hair as he emerged, playfully picking up Cynthia on the way out. The young mouse at first seemed uneasy at being handled by a stranger – one who wasn't even a fellow mouse nonetheless – but then relaxed, enjoying the cuddle. "Morning all."

"Morning Josh," said Mrs Brisby, smiling at the sight of her youngest daughter looking so content in the arms of her new friend, "How are you feeling?"

"Never felt better," Josh said, tickling Cynthia in the tummy, causing her to squeal, "Leg doing okay?" he asked, gesturing at Mrs Brisby's bandaged ankle, which she had sprained in the snake attack last night.

"Already feeling good as new," she said sweetly, "Come on, breakfast is on the table. Teresa dear, would you mind getting the dishes out?" Carrying the still giggling Cynthia on his shoulders, Josh followed them to the kitchen. Only one family member (excluding the sick Timothy) still hadn't shown up yet.

"Is Martin up yet?"

Teresa, who was cutting up, what Josh recognised as, a soft-baked giant pigeon's egg the size of a melon and placing servings on the plates, gestured in the direction of the children's bedroom, "I told him to get up and check on Timmy. Knowing him, the idiot has probably gone back to sleep again. He'll go into another of his tantrums when he finds out he's missed breakfast…"

"Teresa, there is no need to speak about your brother like that!" Mrs Brisby scolded her daughter, preparing a breakfast tray for her youngest son, who was probably still too ill to get out of bed. Josh then remembered Timmy; how was the boy doing? Had the penicillin he had given him worked? Then, suddenly, he realised his survival kit, which he had left with his space suit by the front door last night, was gone! For an instant, he knew fear; had someone been here last night? Maybe that Auntie Shrew had gotten cold feet and reported him to the Rats? Then again, who would take just his _kit_ but leave him alone?

_That little monster…_ he thought with a smirk, as he suddenly realised what had happened. Excusing himself, he followed Mrs Brisby into the bedroom. He first thing he noticed was that Timmy was awake; although noticeably still weak and frail, at least the delirium had passed, indicating his fever had gone down. He smiled, relieved to see that the penicillin had indeed done its job, without any apparent ill effects on the boy. His big brother sat beside his bed, the two of them curiously going through Josh's survival kit, which Martin had sneaked in here last night, right from under his mother's nose.

Although obviously not feeling very approving at having his things nicked and searched, Josh was glad that at least he had removed his gun and taser, which he had placed within easy reach, under his pillow, as a precaution, before turning in last night. The memory of little Cynthia unknowingly holding his loaded gun to her head still haunted him. Mrs Brisby however frowned at the sight of her sons going through her guest's things without permission. She clearly was not pleased at all.

"Martin! Timothy!" she snapped angrily, "What do you think you're doing? Who said you could help yourself to Captain Anderson's belongings? I've taught you better than that! You give it back this instant or so help me…!" But Josh placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder before she could continue scolding them.

"Let them be, they meant no harm by it," he said, approaching to retrieve his belongings, while Mrs Brisby placed the tray on the bedridden Timmy's lap, all the while glaring at her eldest son, who was hastily helping Josh repack his kit, fearing his mother's wrath. Catching the meaning of her stern gaze, he muttered apologetically to Josh, "I…I am sorry Mr Anderson. I just wanted to show Timmy…"

"Never mind, laddie," said Josh, ruffling the boy's hair playfully, retrieving the pair of electric binoculars Martin had been examining, "Curiosity is not a sin after all. However, I suggest you do take your mother's advice and _ask_ _first_ in future." Closing up the kit, satisfied that at least the children had been extremely careful and not damaged anything, he turned to Timmy who was being spoon-fed hot pigeon egg yolk by his mother, much to his annoyance.

"Feeling better now, son?" he asked, tenderly stroking the boy's head. Timmy curiously surveyed Josh for a few seconds; like his siblings, he had heard all about humans from his father's stories his sister used to recite to him and Cynthia, but had always wondered what they really looked like in real life. He smiled.

"Yes, thank you Mr Anderson," he said kindly, shooting Josh a warm-hearted grin. He clearly was intrigued with this strange creature his mother had brought home. Beside him, Mrs Brisby smiled; it had always saddened her that her children didn't have any outside friends or playmates, instead being reliant on each other, but now, the arrival of Josh had completely changed that.

Likewise, the astronaut was feeling equal fondness for the children, as he took out his HHC and performed another x-ray on Timmy's lungs. Although the scan still showed some mild inflammation, at least his pulse and core temperature were only slightly above normal now; the boy would still need a good deal of rest, and would have to be kept warm and comfortable at all costs for a while, but his chances of recovery had definitely improved.

"Do you really come from the stars?" the young mouse asked, unable to withhold his curiosity any longer, his breakfast entirely forgotten. The man gently caressed the boy's cheek in fondness, "I guess you could say that, yeah."

"Could you show us more of those…magical trinkets of yours?" pleaded Martin eagerly, wanting to see more of Josh's 'box of magic tricks', filled with all those amazing trinkets of his. The man grabbed the chubby youngster in a bear hug, playfully ruffling his hair. Timmy snorted at the sight of his big brother trying to squirm out of the man's grip.

"Any time Tiger; just let me have some breakfast first," Josh said, feeling his stomach growling, after not having eaten properly for nearly a week now.

"Mother, can't I come too, please?" Timmy pleaded with his mother, upset at the prospect of being forced to stay alone in bed again, while his siblings had all the fun, "I am so tired of bed…" But Mrs Brisby shook her head sadly.

"I am sorry darling, but not yet. Mr Ages warned me you might get real sick again if you don't keep warm for the next three weeks." Timmy looked utterly frustrated at the prospect of spending the next three weeks confined to bed. Josh however, sympathising for the boy, patted his hand in reassurance.

"It's all right lad, it won't be that long. In the meantime, maybe you'd like to borrow this?" he asked, taking out his pocket survival guide – the only book he carried – and handing it to Timmy. For an instant, it crossed his mind that perhaps the boy couldn't read, but then saw Timmy's eyes light up with interest, as he read the title aloud.

_Everything about this planet is crazy, _Josh thought_, so why shouldn't these humanoid mice also be able to read a language spoken on another world light years away? _

Mrs Brisby smiled; she wasn't a particularly keen reader herself, never having had a full education like Jonathan because of her poor background, but was pleased that at least her children – with the possible exception of Martin, who often considered reading to be dull and stupid – took after her husband's beautiful mind. Timmy had quickly proven to be the keenest pupil of them all, quickly developing good reading skills and had even moved on to practicing writing as well. Unfortunately, their only reading material was her husband's scanty library, as formal education only belonged to the privileged elite classes of Rosebush City, which they couldn't afford. She turned to her youngest son, who was already flipping through the pages with interest.

"Timmy, what do we say to Captain Anderson?"

"Eh… Thank you Captain Anderson," muttered the boy shyly. Josh stroked his hair again, "Don't mention it son. And you can call me _Josh_, not Captain Anderson."

"Come on then, breakfast is getting cold," Mrs Brisby said, picking up Timmy's empty tray and returning to the kitchen. Josh picked up Martin on his shoulders and followed her out, leaving Timmy preoccupied with his reading, no longer sitting bored to death. The rest of the children couldn't wait to finish breakfast, eager to get to know Josh better, undoubtedly thinking they were in for a lot of fun with the alien human. But their mother had other plans.

"Now children, we still have our daily chores to do; you'll have plenty of time to play with Captain Anderson afterwards. Come on now, the sooner we start, the sooner we finish." Ignoring her children's groaning and protesting, she ushered them towards the door so they could get on with their crop harvesting. Winter was only a few weeks away and they were already well behind schedule because of Timmy falling ill; they would have to grind all that corn in the mill before the freeze came to make bread, which was the primary winter food, and they still hadn't even finished their harvest! It would be a tight run making the deadline in time, or they'd surely go hungry.

"You had better go lie down Josh," she said to Josh, "You still need rest…" But Josh was already suiting up, making sure his suit's geological survey tool pouch was handy and in good working order. After hearing that the family was on a serious time crunch to harvest their crops, and as he was now living off their livelihood as that old cow Auntie Shrew had so nicely pointed out, with his advanced power tools handy, he was determined to do something about it.

"Nonsense, I can give you a hand with the work. A soldier doesn't rest while he can still walk," he said to Mrs Brisby, who felt touched; this human was indeed a nice fellow. Gathering up his gear, he followed them out to the plantation. Auntie Shrew, always a hard-working, early-rising person, in spite of her downsides, was already there, working away in silence. She huffed when she saw them.

"About time you showed up! Have those ungrateful piglets of yours been sleeping in again?" she snapped indignantly, handing her niece a stone axe and rope. Ignoring Mrs Brisby's explanations that Timmy needed care, she finished handing out the tools and directed each of them to the sections of the field they were to work on today. Josh wasn't surprised she had brought an axe for him too.

"At least you have the dignity to earn your keep without being _asked to_ first, unlike some other freeloaders I've known," she huffed, although notably with a more approving tone than the rude greeting she had given him the other night. "You'll be working with the children over there; I'll be working with Elisabeth on the other side. Let's see how well you can keep _that_ hindrance of a brat in line." She glared at Martin, who pulled a face at her.

Josh had to struggle to suppress a snort of amusement; the real problem with Auntie Shrew was simply, she didn't have any sense of humour or any sense of fun, which was why the children always drove her mad and vice-versa. He, on the other hand, had always been fond of children, partly because he liked how they always wanted to make the most out of life, unlike his stern, no-nonsense commanding officers, like Fitzgibbons, who literarily treated him like their pet dog, leaving his flying skills to go to waste. The children too, he noticed, looked delighted at being assigned to work with him.

With the corn towering forty feet high, the ears hanging way out of their reach, the only way to collect it was to chop the whole pine-tree-sized corn plant down, literally turning their job of harvesting into a woodcutter's work shift. Someone would have to climb all the way to the top, to secure the rope; then they would have to chop through the three-feet-thick stem, using the rope to direct the fall. The process would have to be likewise repeated for a couple dozens or so corn plants. A pretty straightforward, yet extremely time-consuming task.

Martin wasted no time and tied the rope round his waist, following a routine task he had long since memorized, but had never been so keen on doing promptly until now, wanting to impress the human, "Watch me Josh!" Breaking into a run, the young mouse darted up the plant, with the natural acrobatic skill of his terrestrial counterpart. In an instant, he had secured the rope around the top and tossed the other end down to Teresa, "Pretty cool, huh?"

"Impressive laddie," called Josh, clapping, but frowned when he saw Martin start doing some unnecessary and extremely reckless acrobatics, swinging around the top with only one hand, showing off, "Hey, get down from there. That isn't such a good idea…" Before the words had even past his lips, the boy suddenly lost his grip on the slippery stem, still wet from the morning dew, and came plummeting down. Teresa screamed. It was only thanks to Josh's lighting reflexes, who lunged forward in the nick of time, catching the falling mouse by the tail, which prevented him from slamming headfirst into the ground.

"See Tiger? I told you this wasn't a very good idea, didn't I?" he said, teasingly continuing to dangle the young mouse upside down. Martin seemed to recover pretty fast from the shock of nearly joining his little brother in bed with a serious injury, and glanced up at Josh, starting to feel a little embarrassed by being held in such a helpless position, but still enjoying it nonetheless, "Point taken. Put me down! And it's not funny!" he snapped at his sisters, who, recovering from the shock of seeing him fall, were giggling and pointing at him, amused by his embarrassment. They resumed work.

Taking out a small laser-cutter from his tool pouch, normally meant for collecting tough rock samples which couldn't be cut down to size with a standard pickaxe, Josh turned to the children, "Ready to see me chop down this thing in one go?" Martin and Teresa, who had been gnawing through the bark of the stem, using their pointed front teeth, marking a good spot for him to supposedly chop through the hard part with the axe, stared in confusion at the alien implement in his hand.

"What is that thing?"

"This, kiddos, is a useful little gadget called a diamond-laser cutter," Josh explained, "You use it to cut through the toughest of materials with exact precision, like, say, solid rock or a block of iron, or, in this case, through the trunk of this corn plant. No need to tear your muscles or break your back by slaving away for hours on end with an axe, when you can do the job instantly…"

"You really think you can chop this great big bugger down with that little…nail-like thingy?" Martin scoffed, making a grimace at the sight of the cutter, which was no bigger than a tent peg, clearly unimpressed, "That will never work…!" But Josh only smiled as he fired up the laser head and attacked the stem with it. The youngsters' mouths dropped in surprise as they saw the little red beam burn through the trunk in seconds, like a knife cutting through hot butter. The corn plant tilted, as it came crashing down, its wonderful treasure of ripe corn landing at their feet for them to pick up with their bare hands.

Josh smiled as the children cheered in amazement at his 'magic'. Never before had they seen someone cut down corn plants so fast, the concept of advanced power tools completely unfamiliar to them. Within an hour, they had most of the field levelled, leaving them only the task of collecting the ears of corn and putting it in storage. And ecstatic little Cynthia had run and brought her mother and Auntie Shrew over to see the 'magic' as well; the two adult mice stood staring in utter amazement at the sight of a workload normally meant for a whole staff of labourers to do in a whole day, now complete in record time by one man.

"He's a wizard mama!" squealed Cynthia excitedly, jumping up and down, "Can you see it? Mr Anderson is a wizard!" Josh smiled at the little girl's innocence, as her mother picked her up for a hug, all the while smiling warmly at Josh, muttering her thanks. Even Auntie Shrew seemed impressed but refrained from commenting, instead turning back to the next job at hand.

"So now that we've finished the cutting," she said, waving her walking stick around like an opera conductor, giving orders ("Hey, _Josh_ did all your stinking work!" muttered Martin), "it's time to start loading and storing. Children, you go get the baskets from the shed; the human and I will get the cart ready. Up to it!" While Mrs Brisby hurried back to the house to check on Timmy and get some lunch for everybody, the children, sulking for not getting a break, hurried to the shed to get more of those wicker baskets they used to store corn with. Auntie Shrew led Josh to the edge of the field, where the wooden cart he had seen before stood empty, waiting to be loaded.

Barking orders like a commanding officer to her aid-de-camp, not unlike Fitzgibbons, she and Josh mounted the limbers and dragged the cart over to the chopped-down corn plants. Josh suspected she was being irate and treating him like a servant on purpose, perhaps because she was jealous that he could keep the children in line so easily, while they made her life a living hell, and was testing his limits. But being well accustomed to working under harsh military discipline, put him way beyond letting this old busybody have the satisfaction, knowing his efforts would only benefit Mrs Brisby and her children in the weeks to come, which was just fine with him.

Suddenly, a scream, which he recognised as Cynthia's, was heard from the direction of the shed, where the children had gone to fetch the baskets. A loud commotion followed, indicating there was trouble. Discarding the bundles of corn they had gathered, Josh and Auntie Shrew hurried over to find out what was going on, the former drawing his gun and taser.

Hurrying over to the shed on the edge of the plantation – a smaller rock pile, not unlike the Brisby home, only much smaller –, they saw a terrified Teresa emerge, helping a crying and writhing Cynthia along. Martin followed right behind them, brandishing a bloodstained stick, indicating the aftermath of a struggle. What had happened?

Hurrying up to them, Josh suddenly realised that Cynthia wasn't writhing with _fear_ as he had thought, but with _pain_. She was hurt. Mrs Brisby, who had heard the commotion from the house, came limping over, having fallen behind because of her ankle, gasping at the sight of the moaning Cynthia, who had collapsed into a seizure. As a tearful Teresa set her down, Auntie Shrew bend over her, her usually stern face having turned a lot softer with concern.

"What ever is the matter darling? What happened?"

"I…I can't move…" moaned Cynthia, tears of pain and shock rolling down her face.

"She was bitten," wept Teresa, looking scared half to death, "In the shed, it was lingering among the baskets… Caught us by surprise… I tried to help her but it was too fast…" It was then that Josh noticed the familiar ugly bite of a spider on Cynthia's left leg, slowly turning red and swelling from the venom injected into her bloodstream. The little mouse was in shock and semi-paralysed, the venom acting fast.

Josh wasted no time; ignoring the despairing mice around him, which were all standing at a loss of what to do, he ripped a small strap off his hip toolkit and fashioned a tourniquet. This he applied around Cynthia's leg, cutting off the blood flow in the limb and interrupting the spreading of the venom. Then, elevating the limb, he drew a sterile scalpel he kept in his pocket for just such an occasion, and brought the gleaming blade close to the bite point, about to perform a primitive first-aid procedure for treating poisonous animal bites. Before he could use it however, he suddenly felt Auntie Shrew's walking stick strike him over the shoulder, the children gasping in shock at what he had been trying to do.

"Ow! What the…?"

"What do you think you are doing?!" shrieked the old mouse, brandishing her walking stick furiously in his face, undoubtedly thinking he had been trying to hurt her little niece with that scalpel. Josh roughly brushed the walking stick away, snapping, "I am trying to _help her_ dammit, now get out of the way!"

"By _cutting her_?" shrieked Teresa incredulously, recoiling, protectively cradling her little sister against her, while Martin brandished his own stick menacingly at Josh, any fondness he had previously shown towards the human instantly forgotten. Josh felt frustrated; he knew how to help the girl before him, but because of her family's ignorance that what he was doing was good, they wouldn't let him get on with it while there was still time. He was utterly relieved however when Mrs Brisby stepped in.

"Let him try Auntie Shrew. He knows what he's doing." Josh felt touched, seeing the mother mouse place her trust in him and his strange – and seemingly harmful - methods, against all odds, all for the sake of her child. Auntie Shrew reluctantly stepped aside, yet continued to keep her eagle-like eyes fixed on him, brandishing her walking stick in warning, as Josh got back to work.

"All right, now twist the tourniquet tight and keep the pressure on it." Teresa and Mrs Brisby cradled Cynthia, now barely conscious, half-heartedly following Josh's instructions. "That's it, good. Now then, I have to make an incision to drain the venom from her blood. I assure you, it won't harm her." Wearily nodding her permission, Mrs Brisby, with Auntie Shrew's help, braced the writhing Cynthia. Carefully positioning the scalpel over the bite area, he suddenly cut a smooth gash, drawing blood, but not going deep enough to damage the nerves or major vessels. Cynthia's chilling cry instantly had all the mice on edge, yet luckily refrained from intervening again.

After letting the wound bleed for a few minutes, to drain out the spider venom, they patched up the wound with a clean towel Mrs Brisby had brought, and carried Cynthia back to the house. While Mrs Brisby and Teresa did their best to make her comfortable, Josh took out his medical kit and got to work. Cleaning out both the bite and incision with antiseptic pads, he bandaged it up, stopping the bleeding, and then, with some hesitation, gave Cynthia his second ampoule of penicillin, saving the last dose for Timmy, who might still need some more medicine.

They didn't have to wait long before Cynthia came to; she looked tired and sore, but at least she was comfortable. Performing a scan with his HHC, Josh confirmed that her vital signs were all back to normal, indicating that she had suffered no after-effects. Leaving her to rest, with her siblings keeping her company, Mrs Brisby took Josh aside for a private talk. For a moment Josh thought the mother mouse was going to start yelling at him for using his scalpel on her daughter; he was caught entirely by surprise when she suddenly grabbed him in a firm hug.

"Thank you Josh, thank you so much for helping Cynthia," she said, kissing him on the cheek, "I dread to think what might have happened if you hadn't come. Now I know Jonathan is still watching over us after all…" She broke down sobbing, although it was more out of joy and relief rather than out of grief. Josh hugged her back, trying not to show how much he was enjoying her embrace – it felt like being in the arms of a beautiful woman, which, technically, was exactly what it was.

"You're welcome honey," he said sheepishly, patting her on the back, "Just tell Auntie Shrew never to interrupt a medic administering first aid to a patient; she could have seriously endangered Cynthia's life if you hadn't stepped in… Speaking of which, how come you trusted me when you saw what I was doing, when the others wouldn't?"

"I didn't. In fact, for an instant, I almost wanted to strike you myself," Mrs Brisby admitted, with a slight twinge of shame, "But then, I saw your expression of desperately wanting to help my little girl but we were standing in your way. I really can't explain it; I sort of _felt it _that you meant her no harm… Thank you."

"My pleasure Mrs Brisby…"

"Please, you can call me Elizabeth," said the widow mouse, her beautiful sapphire blue eyes piercing his gaze. For an instant, Josh almost felt tempted to lean over and kiss her but caught himself at the last moment.

_Bloody hell, what am I thinking? She's a bleeding mouse for Christ's sake! Is my space fatigue that bad, it's taking a toll on my psychology or something…? But she's still so beautiful…"_ Shrugging off the lunatic notion that he might actually be falling in love with a _mouse_, he turned and followed her back to the bedroom to check on Cynthia…

With Cynthia now also bedridden, and with the crops all cut ahead of schedule, they had soon called it a day, much to Auntie Shrew's displeasure. She and Josh had returned to the shed, where the man had used his smoke grenades from the crash kit to gas the spider out; the foul creature, almost the size of a fully-grown sheepdog, had emerged, its hairy, skeletal legs twitching furiously, its numerous, mean little eyes fixed on them, as if they were a pair of juicy bugs caught in its web. That was probably the last impression that went through its sickly mind, before the electric bullet from Josh's gun blasted it to slimy smithereens.

As it turned out, it was the only one, rather than a whole lair of them as Josh had feared, probably having made its way into the shed to nibble at the scraps of old corn in the baskets. After declaring the shed clear of any spider infestation and instructing Auntie Shrew to leave it open overnight, to vent out the gas, he had returned to the Brisby home for dinner. Much to everyone's relief, Cynthia hadn't taken long to recover; after a few hours of rest, and giving her plenty of fluids, the little girl was back on her feet again, healthy as a horse, except for her bandaged hip, which would take some time to heal.

That evening, the family gathered together on the rug by the fireplace. Josh had even managed to persuade Elisabeth to let Timmy join them, after assuring her that as long as he kept warm and stayed indoors, there was no risk of his pneumonia flaring up again. The children gathered around eagerly as Josh opened up his kit, passing around the various tools and gadgets for them to see, explaining what they were for.

"…It is used to help find your way when you get lost," he said, trying to explain to Teresa how a magnetic compass worked, "The needle always aligns itself with north; that helps us determine our direction, based on the four general compass headings: north, south, east, and west." The eldest Brisby daughter stared in amazement at the moving needle of the compass in her hands, as it aligned itself with the Nimh-Beta's magnetic field, indicating the direction of the fireplace as 'north' – whatever that place was.

"What about this, Josh?" interrupted Martin, fiddling with the power-multitool; he gasped as he accidentally hit the start button, causing the axel protruding from the top to start spinning wildly. Josh gently took the gadget from the boy and put one of the tool heads – the drill bit – on, to demonstrate. Picking up a log from the stash of firewood by the fireplace, he brought the drill bit close and fired it up, drilling a neat bolthole straight through the wood. The children all stared in awe at the skill and precision of the tool.

"And this is used to tell the exact time and date?" asked Timmy, carefully studying the space watch which Josh had fitted on his wrist (it hung on loosely, like an oversized bracelet, due to the boy's tiny arms). The young mouse continued to stare at the Earthly and Nimh-Beta time readouts on the display, the latter of which Josh had learned from Mrs Brisby, as October 32nd of the year 1082 A.N., whatever calendar system that was. Timmy stared at the Earth's time dial, "Earth… Is this your planet?"

"That's right lad, the home of over twelve billion human beings," said Josh, taking out his HHC and putting up a 3-D rotating model of the Earth for them to see. The children gathered around, muttering excitedly to each other at their first glimpse of a planet from orbital view.

"Your home is _round_?" asked Martin, finding it hard to believe that twelve billion people could survive on that blue sphere floating in the sky (most of the Nimh-Beta population believed their world to be flat), "Don't you fall over the edge…?" Josh burst out laughing at the young mouse's ignorance.

"No, the _gravity_ of the Earth – and of every celestial body, including the one we are standing on right now -, as they say, keeps your feet firmly on the ground," he explained. The children looked utterly baffled, giving him a blank stare. What was gravity? To explain the simple physics, Josh picked up a small pebble and held it high, to demonstrate the force of gravity.

"Sir Isaac Newton once explained why everything falls from the sky to the ground; it's _the force of gravity_ created by the planet's mass." He dropped the pebble, letting it fall onto his outstretched hand. Still nothing. To explain better, he pointed out the window at the horizon, "If you were to set off, walking in a straight line all the way, you'd eventually return to exactly where you started. You'd be walking _around_ the world, which is round itself, because gravity keeps you stuck to the ground everywhere you stand." Finally, Timmy seemed to grasp the jest of Josh's theory.

"So our world is round, like the stars or Nimh-Alpha in the sky, but the force of gravity keeps us, our home, everything stuck on the ground, which is why we don't fall into space." Josh clapped, "Well done Timmy!" The others seemed to finally grasp it as well, Martin in particular, given that he had, technically, briefly been the guinea pig for demonstrating the force of gravity that very morning out on the field. However, he didn't miss the opportunity to point out a potential flaw.

"But if this…gravity thingy keeps us stuck to the ground, how come birds can fly? How could _you_ fly all the way here from the stars?" Although getting slightly irritated at the endless questions, which he could barely explain to them even in the simplest of terms, Josh was patient and did his best to explain how space travel worked. Turning back to his HCC, he brought up a 3-D model of his mothercraft in flight.

"A spacecraft, like the _NIMH-1_, first uses the blast of its engines to escape the Earth's gravity; once in space, where there is no gravity and everything becomes weightless, like feathers, the ship drifts on and on until the gravity of another planet attracts it; then we use the engines to control our descent, for a smooth landing on the surface. In this case, I undertook a voyage that lasted just over four and a half years, most of which I spent sleeping in suspended animation…"

"You've been _sleeping for four years_?" gasped Martin, whistling aloud, "Boy, I wish I could do that trick!" Beside him, his older sister snorted.

"Oh, I bet you would," Teresa said, rolling her eyes, "Given what a sleepy head you are, if we didn't tickle you awake every morning, you'd sleep on until you're as old as Mr Ages and not even realise!" Cynthia and Timothy giggled. Martin pulled a face at his sister. True, he never was a morning mouse and his siblings teaming up to wake him up with some amusing prank every time (unbeknownst to him, on their mother's request) was really getting on his nerves.

"Could you ever take us to see your world?" asked Cynthia eagerly, intrigued by all those fascinating stories their new friend had been telling them over the past few hours, about Earth and the wonders of human civilisation. Josh picked her up onto his lap for a cuddle, running his hands through her soft white fur.

"Someday sweetie, perhaps…"

At that moment, Elizabeth appeared and told them it was time for bed. Bidding Josh goodnight, the children followed their mother into the bedroom so she could tuck them in. It was then that Josh realised, staring out the window at the night sky, that the electromagnetic storm engulfing the planet had finally passed. The sky was crystal clear, all the stars, forming into unfamiliar constellations never seen from Earth, visible. Even Nimh-Alpha glowed brightly against the cloudless sky, the multiple coloured ribbons of gas of its nebulous atmosphere creating a spectacular sight, which any astronomer back on Earth would kill to see this far up close. To Josh however, it meant something more important: _rescue_!

With the storm finally over, the _NIMH-1_, hopefully still orbiting the planet above his head, would soon be making an attempt to land. Although he wouldn't be surprised if Fitzgibbons and the others had probably given him up for dead by now, he realised it would soon be time to say goodbye to his new friends and rejoin his fellow astronauts, so they could get on with their mission. And he would have to get moving soon, as he was over 2,000 miles from the designated landing site, where his crew were bound to look for him first.

Knowing from the schedule Fitzgibbons had made them rehearse so many times over, they would first send down the rest of the unmanned probes, carrying their precious containers of algae and bacteria, to begin the panspermia experiments, at designated locations throughout the surface; they would also send down the REMO, carrying the supplies and equipment for setting up a backup outpost; and finally, the _NIMH-1_ would follow, after the onboard SAR had finished mapping the surface of Nimh Beta, finding them a favourable landing sight to set her down. According to the checklist, he estimated the _NIMH-1_ to be around twelve to fifteen hours away from landing; that was the exact amount of time he had to let them know he was still alive and kicking.

First thing in the morning, he decided, he would climb to the summit of the Lee of the Stone, and set up his communications relay tower and attempt to re-establish contact with the _NIMH-1_. As he followed Elizabeth into the master bedroom, so they could turn in as well, his mind was filled with the painful thought that he would soon be saying farewell to this wonderful family of humanoid mice that had taken him in…

**Author's note:** Coming up next, Josh attempts to regain contact with the _NIMH-1_ and word of his arrival begins to spread… Until next time then. Enjoy and please review!


	8. Chapter 8 A Signal of Hope

**Location: The Brisby Farm, the Lee of the Stone. **

New Mission Time: Day 7

It was early dawn on the seventh day on Nimh Beta when Josh found himself making his way up to the top of the Lee of the Stone with Elizabeth, to set up his communications tower. Having left the children peacefully sleeping, she had led Josh up a narrow footpath, all the way up to the top of the rock formation overlooking her farm in the green valley below.

From up here, they had an excellent view; the green lush stretched out in the every direction, with the edge of the desert barely visible in the far distance. The river zigzagged through the trees, gleaming like a silvery snake in the light of the twin suns that shone over the alien planet. Below, at the foot of the Stone, smoke rose from the chimneys of the Brisby home and Auntie Shrew's, which were barely visible against the landscape because of their semi-subterranean architecture. In the distance, another smoking chimney was visible, which Elizabeth had explained, was Mr Ages' home.

Josh stood admiring the stunning view, thinking regretfully of how such a pristine landscape was extremely hard to find back on Earth, where over three quarters of the natural environment had long since been overrun by the effects of human impact. Turning to his friend, he saw her nervously backing away from the edge, cringing at the sight of the long drop before them. Josh smiled at her, remembering how she had clung nervously onto him all the way up the narrow path on the side of the steep rock, "Scared of heights, honey?"

"Terrified," she mumbled, grasping her cape in anxiety, "I can't even climb a ladder without getting goosebumbs…" Josh chuckled.

"Don't worry about it. Half the people I've trained to fly with have this problem. It passes after a therapy session of about a hundred rides a day up a 500-storey skyscraper in a glass elevator, and then doing a bungee-jump from the roof…" Elizabeth visibly shuddered at the thought of such an acrophobia 'therapy session', burying her face in her hands in fright. Josh sighed, realising he had taken the joke a little too far.

"I'm sorry, didn't mean to scare you," he said, pulling her into his embrace and kissing her head. Elizabeth weakly smiled up at him, "It's all right Josh, Jonathan always used to tease me about it. At least the children don't have this problem…" Josh had no doubt about that; after observing Martin's antics in the field yesterday, he knew the children were as comfortable with heights as acrobats in a circus – or, in his case, as pilots.

Opening up his kit, he unpacked the portable relay tower and set it up. Nailing its small pedestal into the rocky ground using pegs designed for that purpose, he unfolded the tower's solar panels, which would keep its batteries charged, capable of letting it run independently for months or even years. Extending the antennas, making sure they were all fully functional, he took out his HHC.

Typing in various commands into his touch pad, he set up a locked two-way transmission between his suit radio and the tower, setting up long-range communications. Doing a quick system's check, he started scanning for any receiving signals out there. At first, there seemed to be nothing within his 250-mile transmission radius; the voice channels were all silent and all data receptors read nil. But then, suddenly, he picked up something. Situated some 110 miles to the north, was a signal, faint but definitely real, blinking on his HHC radar screen. A quick transponder signature identification check confirmed it was indeed what he was looking for.

"Blimey, they're already here!" Josh said, staring the familiar _NIMH-1_'s transponder signal, confirming his crew had made it to the surface, and were probably looking for him at this very moment. Switching over to voice transmissions, he sent out a distress signal.

"Mayday, mayday! This is Captain Anderson calling _NIMH-1_. _NIMH-1_, do you copy, over?" But no answer came; the radio was silent, save from some mild static. Confused, he enhanced his frequency and tried again, "Repeat _NIMH-1_, this is Captain Anderson, declaring an emergency! Alpha Scout is down; pilot stranded. Requesting alternate transport. Please confirm, over!" Still nothing. What was going on?

"Can't they hear you?" asked Elizabeth, to whom Josh had briefly explained how radio technology worked, as she watched her friend continue to fiddle around with his instruments without success.

"They should," said Josh, trying another frequency, resorting to even texting in a message, but without getting a reply, or even a confirmation that someone on the other end had received it at all, "According to this signal, the _NIMH-1_ is out there somewhere," he said, pointing out to the northern horizon, "It's almost as if there is nobody on the other end to answer back. But that's impossible…"

True, it was no secret that Commander Fitzgibbons always insisted on a 24-hour watch on the flight deck, with shifts divided between the crew, and with the communications station always manned around the clock. To be unable to receive because of an unmanned radio station was unthinkable; it made more sense to assume that all the onboard comms were down because of some glitch. But what kind of glitch could knock one of the most sophisticated communication assemblies, equipped with multiple auxiliary units, off the air? Had something unforeseen happened to his crew?

Elizabeth, meanwhile, Josh suddenly noticed, was looking just as perplexed – almost alarmed - as he was; but it wasn't so much about his crew being strangely silent, but because of where he said they had landed. She pointed towards the northern horizon, from where Josh said he was picking up the signal of the _NIMH-1._

"Josh, out there is said to be Thorn Valley, where the Temple of the Great Owl is; that's where my husband had gone exploring before he disappeared…"

Before Josh could inquire what this 'Temple of the Great Owl' place was, suddenly, both of them were caught off-guard by voices coming up the hill. And, this time, it wasn't the children following them. Hastily grabbing his gear, Josh and Elizabeth took cover behind a nearby boulder, just as two new arrivals appeared on the scene. Josh caught sight of a tall, slender rat, wearing, what resembled, a medieval-style officer's tunic; his companion was an aged, pudgy mouse with thick spectacles, resembling a nerdy scholar of sorts. The two of them were carrying a large bundle of some bright fabric, which looked very familiar to Josh…

"…Come on, Justin, you feather-head! Stop playing about!" the old mouse scolded his rat companion, who was amusing himself by wrapping his head up in the fabric, pulling comical faces behind his back. Elizabeth gasped in surprise as she recognised the newcomers.

"That's my neighbour Mr Ages," she said, pointing out her irritable mouse neighbour, from whom she had been seeking medicine for Timmy the day they had met, "And that's Justin; he's an old friend of Jonathan's, Captain of the Guards at Rosebush City, and godfather to my children." Josh however barely heard any of this as he suddenly recognised the bundle of nylon and cords Mr Ages and Justin had dragged up here with them.

"Hey, that's the drogue chute from my pod!" he whispered to Elizabeth, who seemed just as surprised at the realisation as he was. Sure enough, as they unfolded it, Josh clearly saw the _NIMH-1_ logo painted on the nylon, gleam in the sunlight. And that could mean only one thing: the Rats must have discovered his wrecked pod back at the lake where he had abandoned it, and salvaged it for inspection. They were picking up his trail pretty fast.

As they watched, they saw the mouse called Ages don a makeshift harness fashioned out of reeds, to which the loose cords of the chute were attached. Apparently having figured out what the chute was for, the old mouse inventor was going to experiment flying with it.

Elizabeth watched in confusion as the two of them worked getting the parachute ready, oblivious to what they meant to do, but Josh, who knew the physics of flying as well as he knew how to spell his own name, realised the pair of them were looking for trouble. Given that the chute was designed to slow down a 30,000lbs spacecraft in flight, travelling at supersonic speeds, for Mr Ages' small weight, the enormous drag it created would be too much. What's more, the Lee of the Stone was nowhere high enough for a safe jump.

In an instant, Josh found himself torn between breaking his cover and stopping the old mouse from probably killing himself with his reckless experiment, or staying put and not revealing himself. Elizabeth and her family had proven themselves to be trustworthy; what if these two were not the same? The mention that this strange rat was the 'Captain of the Guards' of all people had him aroused with suspicion. Could they have sent him here, looking for him?

Looking, he saw that Ages, unfortunately, wasn't thinking twice of the dangers involved in his experiment as he confidently stood on the edge of the cliff, about to take a run and jump. Behind him, Justin held the folded-up parachute at the ready, preparing the throw it into the wind after Ages. The carefree-looking rat chuckled, "I hope you know what you're doing, you crazy old goat."

"Never underestimate the grand principles of science, dear boy," said Ages pompously, consulting a diagram of the parachute he had drawn up, "There is more solid truth in there, than you're likely to find anywhere else. And if my prototype works, it'll revolutionise my research beyond anything we've achieved so far."

"_Your_ prototype?" said Justin, raising his eyebrows, his amused expression suddenly turning more serious, "This thing didn't arrive here on its own. And I, for one, would like to know to whom – or _what_ - it belongs…" From his hiding spot, Josh felt his insides twist up, realising that they were indeed hunting him down…or so it sounded. Ages, however, was completely unconcerned about where the alien contraption had come from, too preoccupied with his experiment.

"Finders keepers, dear boy," he said, tucking away his spectacles in his tunic and tightening his harnesses, preparing to jump, "All right then, on the count of three. One, two…!"

Josh's mind was racing; in another second, Ages would be plummeting to his death; but if he tried to stop him, he would inevitably be revealing himself to this rat soldier out hunting him down. And they'd be no turning back, once he blew his cover… But as he glanced at Elizabeth, who gasped, petrified with fear, also realising what Ages meant to do, he made up his mind. His friend would never forgive him if he let her old neighbour knowingly kill himself… Suddenly, together they burst out from their hiding spot.

"…three…!"

"Hey, wait, stop!" Josh shouted, sprinting towards Ages, "Don't jump you idiot…!"

Caught by surprise at the sound of a strange voice, Justin turned round and spotted his late friend's widow, whom he'd always had a soft spot for, running towards him, seemingly in greeting, "Oh, hallo Biff, no time no see…" he said, but froze in mid-sentence as he caught sight of Josh also running behind her, thinking that strange creature was chasing her. It happened so fast; one instant, Josh was darting towards Ages, before he could go over the edge, and the next he found himself facing the tip of a drawn sword, level with his throat. Justin's expression was fierce and menacing.

"Stay back, you foul creature!" he growled dangerously, "Just touch her, and I'll split you open like a rabbit…!"

Seeing the rat soldier draw his weapon on him, Josh had instinctively also drawn his Taser, expecting an imminent attack, while Elizabeth, swept protectively behind Justin's back by the larger rat's arm at the sign of trouble, was trying to break up the conflict.

"Justin, no, wait! He's a friend…!

In the confusion however, they had all completely forgotten about Ages, who, startled by the unexpected interruption, had lost his balance, and plummeted over the edge of the cliff. It was only thanks to the trailing parachute getting snagged on a protrusion, which kept him from landing onto the jagged rocks below, instead leaving him hanging several feet in the air, the wind slamming him against the cliff face like a marionette on strings. His cry broke up the imminent scuffle, diverted everyone's attention back to the cliff.

Hurrying over, they saw the old mouse hanging in the air below, battered and groaning. With Justin not taking his eyes off Josh, sword still in hand, they all grabbed hold of the chute, before it could break loose, and pulled the dazed – and very pissed off - Ages back up. The expression of amazement and shock, which crossed the swearing mouse's face, as he came face to face with a real flesh-and-blood human, was unbelievable.

"Great Jupiter, woman!" he shouted indignantly, "What do you mean sneaking up on us like that? Can't you see we're in the middle of something important here…? What the…?" He suddenly fell silent, petrified with amazement at the sight of Josh, who was holding him up by his shirt collar. In another instant, his amazement gave way to fear.

"Put me down, you…you…you bloody human!" he bellowed, thrashing around in a panic. Before Josh could try and reassure him however, he felt a shadow loom over him from behind. He spun round, just in time to see another, larger rat, also in a soldier's tunic, and as fearsome and intimidating as a charging bull, spring at him in a surprise attack.

Josh barely managed to dodge the first blow of the rat's razor-sharp battle-axe, which came swinging at his head; but before he could retrieve his Taser and stun his assailant, the deranged rat, with lightning reflexes, brought the axe handle swinging from the other side… The solid wood impacted with his skull with the force of a baseball bat, sending him crumpling to the ground. The last thing he heard before his world faded to darkness all around him, was Elizabeth, Justin and Ages all shouting, "No, Brutus, hold your fire…!"

**Author's note: **Sorry this chapter came out so short, but I think leaving it hanging on a cliffhanger between chapters creates a good flow of suspense in the story. I promise the next chapter will be longer. Enjoy and please review! 


	9. Chapter 9 The Bargain

Stars and blurriness obscured Josh's vision, as he felt himself slowly return to consciousness; he felt nauseous, his skull throbbing with the worst headache of his life. Disorientated and confused, he realised he was no longer up on the Lee of the Stone, but back in the guest room in the Brisby home. The last thing he could remember was being snuck up from behind by that other rat and knocked out… What had happened? He could hear excited chatter coming from the kitchen.

"…But I am telling you Justin, he is harmless! He saved my life and Timmy's; Cynthia would also be seriously hurt if it weren't for him! You can't turn him over to the Council, please!" Josh could recognise Elizabeth voice pleading with the rat he remembered was called Justin.

"But Biff, he's a human! An outsider! What's more, he's branded with the evil mark of Nimh itself! The Council could have you – _have us all_ – prosecuted for heresy and treason if we don't turn him in…!

"Hang the Council regulations! This needs some more careful thinking," came the pompous voice of the old mouse, Mr Ages, "Haven't you been listening about all those extraordinary skills he possesses, of flying, and healing, and fighting, and…? Why, from what I've been hearing all afternoon, he could be the key to the greatest scientific discovery of all time, even greater than the missing Stone of Knowledge itself! We must think twice about even talking to those cretins just yet; with that paranoid fool Jenner on the Council, they'll just hush the whole thing up and bury it without a second thought…!"

Putting a hand up to his head, he felt a turban of linen dressings Elizabeth must have applied, patching up his head wound. Although he was definitely suffering from concussion, at least he didn't seem to have fractured his skull. He was just about to try and get to his feet, when he felt a large hand roughly push him back down, before the familiar blade of a battle-axe loomed into his view, hovering threateningly just over his face; looking to his left, he recognised the same large rat who had attacked him up on the rock, standing guard.

"You stay right where you are, stranger!" snarled the large rat in warning, his temptation of using his weapon on a hair-trigger, "One false move and you'll be carrying your head under your arm before you know it!" He didn't spare Josh so much as a glance, his furry, ham-like hands firmly clutching his weapon, ready to strike at the first given opportunity. Feeling rather nervous from being pinned to a bed by a mad guard-soon-to-be-executioner with an axe, all alone, Josh tried to reason out with him.

"Take it easy pal, I am a friend of Mrs Brisby's…" But the rat only growled threateningly, lowering the gleaming blade even closer to his face in warning. Although his menacing attitude seemed to be more a case of over-cautiousness than malice, he would hear none of it, as he growled back at Josh.

"I will not be fooled by a Nimh spy! And you're not going anywhere until my Captain has decided what is to be done with you – personally, I'd just hand you over to the Council right now, dead or alive. And if you want to _stay alive_ until such time, I suggest you do as you're told, and that includes holding your tongue while you're at it… And, for the last time, you lot aren't allowed in here!" he barked over his shoulder to, Josh noticed, the children, which were watching fearfully from the doorway.

"Brutus, I am telling you he's a friend…!" Martin tried arguing with the large rat soldier, who only seemed to grow more irritated at being pestered about his prisoner by a bunch of – as far as he was concerned - mindless children, which apparently had no idea what they were doing.

"Idiot boy!" he snapped, now really cross, his anger visibly frightening the children, "Nimh is your greatest enemy! Didn't your father ever teach you anything? You mother should have known better than to let this…this _scoundrel_ into your home…!" He gave them such an angry stare that they turned tail and disappeared without another word. Unfortunately, his yelling was loud enough to carry all the way down to the kitchen.

"I will thank you not to yell at my children when you're in my house, Brutus!" Elizabeth said sharply, hurrying over with Justin in tow, and holding the snivelling Teresa against her reassuringly. Behind them, Mr Ages also came limping over with the help of a makeshift crutch, his left leg in a cast, after having broken it on the cliff face that morning. Brutus however seemed beyond any rationality as he rounded on Mrs Brisby.

"Have you lost your senses, woman?" he roared, stepping forward, "You are extremely lucky this human didn't hurt you or your children! Jonathan always said you were smarter than this, you gullible, dumb female…!" But this took it a bit too far as Justin stepped forward.

"That's enough Brutus!" he barked angrily, "Be that as it may, you're still talking to a lady, so mind your manners!" Brutus seemed to want to push it even further but then fell silent, his military code of command winning out over his sentiments. But, in the midst of all this arguing, he had completely forgotten about Josh; alarmed, he turned back to his prisoner, only to see the children, who had sneaked past him while he had been yelling at their mother, lovingly embracing the human, who hugged them back with equal fondness.

"We thought he was going to kill you Josh!" said Teresa, wincing at the sight of Josh's bandaged head, "Are you all right?" Josh shot Brutus a reproachful glare for giving the children such a scare with his threatening display.

"I'm just fine sweetheart," he said, patting her on the back reassuringly, "Just fine…" Beside her sister, Cynthia was sniffling tearfully, clinging protectively to Josh's sleeve, "Justin says they'll have to take you away…" Even Josh couldn't find any words to reassure her, feeling his own sense of dread kicking in.

Meanwhile, the rats – with the possible exception of Brutus - were all staring, stunned in amazement at the sight of the children and this alien human being so intimate with each other. Brutus seemed about to intervene and usher the children away, but Justin held him back. What he had originally assumed to be an intruder, possibly with hostile intentions, looked anything but that now. Only Elizabeth smiled warmly, completely content with her children being in the arms of this stranger, her expression showing equal admiration.

"Well, I guess introductions are in order," said Justin finally, breaking the silence, "I am Captain Justin Wilson, commander of the Rosebush City garrison; this is my aid-de-camp Sergeant Brutus Stanton. And the weird old goat here is Professor Horatio Ages, Deputy President of the Rats' Academy of Sciences." The pudgy mouse Ages cast Justin a brief glare for calling him a 'weird old goat', but shrugged it off, eager to satisfy his scientific curiosity regarding their new acquaintance.

"Captain Josh Anderson, _NIMH-1_ Mission," said Josh, reluctantly offering his hand to shake. Justin and Ages returned the greeting warmly, but Brutus only glared at him, still brandishing his battle-axe at the ready. Ignoring him, Josh launched into his story of where he came from and how he had met Elizabeth and her family.

"So you are the pilot of that strange flying contraption Justin's scouts discovered out on the lake," exclaimed Mr Ages, explaining how some fisherman had discovered Josh's pod a few days ago when their boat had been snagged in the floating parachute, which they had salvaged from the water after cutting its lines. Swimmers had been sent down to examine the alien pod, finding it empty; but the tabooed_ NIMH_ logo on the hull hadn't gone amiss, prompting Justin and Brutus to go on a solo assignment to inspect the surrounding area for any signs of trouble. Ages had taken charge of the chute, for his 'scientific investigations', but they had been unable to salvage the pod itself, which was too heavy to lift with even their most sophisticated equipment – mostly ropes and pulleys, mounted on rafts.

"And you say you're part of a band of explorers from the stars?" asked Justin, likewise intrigued, trying to determine whether or not these human visitors posed any threat to his people. So far, Josh's explanation didn't seem to indicate any prospect of hostilities, if not sounding a tad bit difficult to imagine; in other words, he had no idea what to make of it. Unfortunately, someone else already knew exactly what was to be done.

"We have to turn him in to the Council at once, Justin," said Brutus sternly, "Nicodemus has to know about this. You heard him; this isn't just one human we're talking about here, it's a whole invasion!" For an instant, Josh wished he had kept quiet about the rest of his crew being somewhere out there at this very moment, waiting for him. "If his associates decide to strike, we'll be caught completely by surprise, and we'll be entirely responsible!"

The children also seemed to notice Justin's uncertainty at making a decision, as they turned, looking at him pleadingly, "Please Justin, you can't take Josh away from us now, you can't!" begged Teresa, tears in her eyes, shaking her godfather by his tunic.

"Stay out of this child!" snapped Brutus, "Law and order may spoil your fun sometimes, but it saves lives in the end…" Justin however, always having a soft spot for his godchildren and feeling real cruel at the thought of disappointing them now, had made up his mind. He hadn't been sent here to arrest anybody, but simply to check that everything was all right, and to assist Ages with his experiment. As long as there was no sign of any illegal or dangerous activities, technically it wasn't his duty to detain the human. And this Josh Anderson character seemed more or less harmless…at least for now.

"All right, we'll call it to vote," he finally said, "Those in favour that we _postpone_ reporting our new friend here to the Council?" Everyone except Brutus raised their hands in favour. The warrior rat looked outraged.

"By the Great Owl, what's this?" he shouted incredulously, "A Captain of the Guards should not be putting his duty to vote! You're talking about directly contradicting the law and authority we've sworn to serve and enforce! Aiding and abating a potentially dangerous stranger makes us accessories to this, liable to prosecution! If we're caught, the court-marshal will have our ranks for this…"

"I am not suggesting we conceal anybody," Justin said firmly, stating his own terms of the agreement, "We will stick around and make sure Captain Anderson is safely reunited with his crew; but then we make a full report to the Council about these visitors. I am sure Nicodemus will be happy to have two representatives out there, if there're going to be any peaceful diplomacies between us."

Although Josh couldn't exactly guarantee any peaceful diplomacies, knowing how Commander Fitzgibbons could be unpredictable at times, especially when it came to going by the book, he couldn't hope for a better deal at this point. His sense of uneasiness apparently didn't go amiss to Brutus, who finally nodded in agreement, but not before adding, "Very well Justin, as you are my commanding officer, whom it's my duty to obey, I'll go along with this reckless escapade and keep my mouth shut. But I give our friend fair warning," he said, turning to Josh, "If he double-crosses us, I'll personally hand him over to the Council in irons…or in several neatly dismembered pieces."

"Then I guess it's settled," said Justin, ignoring Elizabeth furiously reprimanding Brutus for talking such gruesome threats in front of the children. He turned back to Josh, "So, where are your friends then?"

"Somewhere up north," the man explained, remembering his instrument readings from earlier that morning, "Elizabeth – I mean _Mrs Brisby_ – said it was that same place her husband had been looking for years ago…Thorn Valley I think she called it…" Not surprisingly, everyone was struck dumb in amazement and surprise.

"Your companions are at Thorn Valley?" gasped Justin, suddenly feeling suspicious at the thought of a band of alien humans trespassing at the legendary holy site, where the Temple of the Great Owl was, "What the blazes are they doing over there?" Josh shrugged his shoulders.

"I don't know; I suppose it was the first favourable landing site they spotted. Who knows…?"

"And how exactly to you propose we get there?" asked Brutus. Like everyone else, he knew Jonathan's story very well, and that a journey to Thorn Valley wasn't a Boy Scouts' picnic.

"I don't really know," said Josh thinking, "We could trek there I suppose. There's no risk of getting lost out in the desert; the homing signal on my HHC should lead us straight to them…"

"Well, then maybe you'd like to explain to us how you intend to trek through the Dark Mountains, which lie between us and the Valley," said Ages, "The last one to brave that passing never returned…"

"Why, what the hell's out there?"

"The Dark Mountains are the lair of the Exiles," explained Justin grimly, "Outlaw bandits – mostly banished political criminals or runaways -, who give us all sorts of trouble, like raiding and looting villages, kidnapping women and children for ransom or slave labour…" Josh frowned; these cutthroat Exiles didn't sound like a charming bunch one bit. But he couldn't give up now.

"Even if you knew every step of your way across the desert, you'd never make it to Thorn Valley on foot, dear boy," said Mr Ages, "Crossing through Exile territory is death…" But Josh, considering his options, had suddenly come up with an interesting idea.

"And who says we have to _walk_ to Thorn Valley?" he asked with a smile on his face. His idea was probably going to be a long shot, but with his crew not responding to his distress signal, he knew he had little choice. At least, it had more potential than taking his chances and hiking across hostile territory; even his advanced weaponry couldn't take out a whole lair of bandits if they ambushed them on the way. "What if we could _fly_ there?" His friends looked as if he had gone mad.

"If this is a joke pal, I fail to see the humour in this," said Justin sharply; clearly, the case about Thorn Valley, which was directly related to the demise of his old friend, was no laughing matter as far as he was concerned. Mr Ages, however, seemed to catch on Josh's plan faster.

"Are you proposing that we built another of your…flying contraptions?" asked the old inventor, the wheels in his head suddenly turning wildly; if this human knew the secret of flying – his lifelong ambition -, then he was going to learn it from him, even if it meant selling his soul to the Great Owl Himself, "Can it be done?"

Josh nodded, grinning from ear to ear, "With the parachute you salvaged, we have all the materials we need to rig up a glider, and fly it across the desert and the Dark Mountains, all the way to Thorn Valley!" With his Cambridge degree in aeronautical engineering, combined with his flying experience, building a working glider would be a synch. That is, if his friends all agreed to go ahead with this project, which, judging by their expressions, seemed very unlikely.

"You damn near killed yourself today pursuing that fantasy of yours, you old crackpot!" growled Brutus to Ages, "Do you really have such a death wish, that you're willing to put your faith in this human, and help him get some death-trap contraption off the ground?" Ages gave Brutus a disgusted look, but said nothing, possibly also beginning to have second thoughts about Josh's plan, as he tenderly nursed his bandaged leg.

"I trust Josh," said Elizabeth finally, taking Josh's hand, "I have seen him do some extraordinary things for me and my children, to convince me he knows what he's doing, so I am with him on this!" Josh could have kissed her but then decided against it at the sight of Justin giving him a rather jealous look.

"Then, I guess we're all in this together," said Teresa, her siblings muttering excitedly to each other at Josh's plan, "So when do we start?"

That evening found Josh sitting at the kitchen table, using some of Jonathan's old parchment, quill and carbon markers, drawing up the schematic of the glider he and his friends would need to reach Thorn Valley. Using his HHC to perform the critical calculations of the aerodynamics, drogue coefficients, and stress factors required for the design, the prototype starting taking shape on paper.

With no addition guest beds left to spare, Justin and Brutus had curled up in sleeping bags by the fire, accustomed to sleeping under far worse conditions than this. Although, fortunately, they had kept their word and not been much of a hassle to Josh, they hadn't let him out of their sight all day, and Brutus had even insisted on sleeping with his sword and battle-axe in hand, after personally barricading the front door, keeping everyone confined inside the house until morning, much to Elizabeth's displeasure.

Mr Ages had returned to his home with the help of Justin, where they'd be meeting him the following day, to set up shop in his laboratory.

Elizabeth sat with Josh at the table, sipping on a mug of hot broth, as she watched her friend working away, admiring his patience and dedication. Every now and then he would wink at her, happy with her company, as he silently continued on with his drawings and calculations, none of which made much sense to Elizabeth, yet still intrigued her. Deep down she knew that in a few days, it would be time to say goodbye and she wanted to make every moment she had left with her friend count.

"Here we are, this is it," Josh finally said, showing her the completed diagram of a delta-shaped, biplane aircraft, with nylon wings stretched on a thin wooden framework, with twin booms stretching aft, supporting the two vertical stabilizers and central elevator fin. All of this was mounted atop a pair of wooden skies with sharp undersides, designed to skid across the flat desert floor for take-off. A small sitting space in the middle of this assembly, between the stacked wings, allowed enough room for four passengers and one pilot to lie flat, strapped to the wing surface with harnesses. A series of scribbles on the edge of the drawing listed the dimensions and characteristics of the glider. A far more professional and aerodynamically sound structure that Mr Ages' experimental prototype.

Although the science made little sense to Elizabeth, who could barely read, the sketch looked mighty appealing to her, as she run her small furry hand across it in silent admiration. Her eyes fell upon the five figures lying flat in the seating area of the fuselage, which Josh had dubbed 'the cradle'.

"How come there are _five_ of you? I thought it was you, Justin, Brutus, and Ages who are going…" She was surprised when Josh gently took her hands into his and turned her round to face him.

"Because you're coming too Elizabeth," he said, smiling at her stunned expression, "I want you to see what my ship is like, along with the others. You, of all people, definitely have earned that privilege." Elizabeth's surprise suddenly gave way to fear as she realised what Josh was proposing.

"But that means I'll have to fly with you on this…glider?" she exclaimed, shuddering at the thought, "Josh, I couldn't do that! Remember, I'm terrified of heights…!"

Josh sighed sadly; he didn't know whether it was really due to her fear of heights or because she knew they would have to eventually say farewell anyway, when the mission would have to return to Earth and report their findings to the world. Josh already knew that, in spite of the tape parade, publicity, and money this expedition would bring to his name, he would be forced to leave everything he really cared for, back here on this crummy planet. Even if he were chosen for the return expedition, scheduled to launch upon their successful return, it would be ten years or so before he saw this place again, by which time Elizabeth would have probably forgotten about him altogether and remarried, her children all grown up.

Gently, he pulled her into his arms to embrace her; Elizabeth hugged him back and Josh could swear he felt a tear trickle down her face and land on his shoulder. He gently run his fingers through her hair, trying to reassure her.

"Elizabeth, how come Justin keeps calling you 'Biff'?" he asked, suddenly remembering that odd name he had heard her rat friend call her by when he had greeted her up on the Lee of the Stone that morning. Elizabeth burst out giggling like a schoolgirl discussing her first boyfriend.

"Just some stupid nickname my parents made up for me, when I couldn't pronounce my name properly as a child. My husband and Justin always called me by that too. I always thought 'Elizabeth' was too formal for a poor, peasant girl like me anyway…"

"I'll let you know you happen to share the same name as our King's great-grandmother, who had the golden heart of a lion, just like you." Although, deep down, Elizabeth felt she had nothing in common with her long-deceased namesake, the late Queen Elizabeth II of England where Josh came from, she smiled.

"I'll take that as a compliment Josh," she said, kissing him on the cheek. Josh smiled, holding her close, letting her sit on his lap.

"I didn't mean it as a compliment, Biff," he said, using Elizabeth's nickname for the first time, "Her late Sovereign Majesty had the same dedication and love for her people as you have for your children. And only someone with a heart of gold can have such courage." He placed his hand over Elizabeth's heart, "Someday, probably after I'm gone, you'll know what I mean."

Not to keen to start pondering again on the miserable thought of the approaching time, when they'd have to part ways for good, Elizabeth bed Josh goodnight and went off to bed. Josh stayed awake a while longer to revise his calculations one more time, and add a few last touches to his schematics, which he'd be delivering to Ages' lab in the morning, so they could start work.

Finally finished, he retreating to the bedroom himself, to get some shuteye, pausing on the way only to pull the loose blankets over Elizabeth's shoulders as she slept. Undressing, he got into the bed and blew out the oil lamp on the bedside table between the two beds. For a while he lay awake, admiring his friend's beautiful face against the patch of Nimh-Alpha light coming from the window, before drifting off to sleep as well.

Unbeknownst to him, Justin, who had been lying awake in the other room all this time, only pretending to be asleep, was lost in thoughts. All day he had been pondering about this strange human and his wild tale. Although he was beginning to like this fellow, despite every indication that he came from the legendary dark Land of Nimh, he wasn't so sure about Josh's building relationship with Elizabeth he had been observing all afternoon.

Justin was not the kind of rat to hold grudges easily, or start feuds with others simply to satisfy his personal feelings; but watching Elizabeth and this stranger being so intimate with each other was getting a little too personal for his liking. Although he was sure neither would admit it, he could tell that Elizabeth secretly harboured deep feelings for Josh, and vice-versa. And that was troubling him.

Since Jonathan's passing four years ago, he had been secretly hoping of winning Elizabeth's heart someday, despite how mouse-rat relationships were often deeply frowned upon by many of his superiors, not unlike the old race and social divisions and taboos known on Earth. And now, because of Josh, his dream was being torn asunder. Part of him felt that it wasn't his business to interfere, and that he'd be betraying his friend's memory if he did; but the other hoped that this Josh fellow would soon go his own merry way…

**Author's note:** So now, we have all the protagonists brought together as a group; the antagonists are soon to come. The introduction of the Exiles was actually a last-minute thought, after I thought about making this story partly _An American Tail_ crossover later on. Tribute goes to RogueFanKC, who gave me the idea of making Justin slightly jealous of Josh because of his feelings towards Elizabeth. Coming up next, the construction of the glider and Josh gets to know his new companions better… ENJOY AND PLEASE REVIEW!


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